Multiple sclerosis and air pollution exposure: mechanisms toward brain autoimmunity

Publication date: Available online 11 January 2017
Source:Medical Hypotheses
Author(s): Sayed Esmaeil Mousavi, Pouria Heydarpour, Jacques Reis, Masoud Amiri, Mohammad Ali Sahraian
The association between neurodegenerative diseases and environmental exposures, in particular air pollution, has been noticed in the last two decades, but the importance of this environmental factor in Multiple Sclerosis (MS) pathogenesis has not been considered extensively. However, recent evidence suggests that major mechanisms involved in MS pathogenesis, such as inflammatory factors expression, free radicals overproduction, the blood brain barrier (BBB) breakdown, neuroinflammation, vitamin D deficiency and mitochondrial dysfunction could also occur due to exposure to air pollutants. A prospective hypothesis is suggested here in which exposure to air pollutants may initiate destructive mechanisms inducing inflammatory-oxidative cascades, reduction of immunological self-tolerance and neurodegeneration leading to brain autoimmunity.



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