General
Presenter:
Maartje Huijbers, PhD (LUMC, Leiden, The Netherlands)
Host:
Gestur Vidarsson
Abstract course:
“Antibodies are an important defense mechanism of our body, but can also cause disease. IgG4 is one of four IgG antibody subclasses and is considered unique and benign because it is incapable of activating immune cell-mediated cytotoxicity, complement-mediated tissue damage and, due to Fab-arm exchange, interacts with its antigen in a monovalent fashion. In spite of this, IgG4 has recently been shown to cause serious pathology in an increasing number of IgG4 autoimmune diseases. I will discuss how the unique features of IgG4 contribute to the development of MuSK myasthenia gravis, a prototypic IgG4 autoimmune disease. I will furthermore dive into why these autoimmune responses are dominated by IgG4 and show some preliminary data on the unique features of IgG4 B cells.”
Background information:
Dr. Maartje G. Huijbers is associate professor and group leader at the department of Human Genetics and the department of Neurology at LUMC. Maartje’s career started in the lab of Josep Dalmau (UPenn, Philadelphia) where she contributed to the discovery of two new antigens for central nervous system autoimmunity. She continued her passion for neuroimmunology research by starting a PhD in the lab of Prof. dr. Jan Verschuuren and Prof. Dr. Silvère van der Maarel at LUMC. Maartje obtained her PhD in 2016 from Leiden University for her work on the pathomechanism of MuSK myasthenia gravis ( a neuromuscular autoimmune disease). Using in vitro and in vivo models she studied whether and how patient-derived IgG4 causes myasthenic muscle weakness. During her PhD she visited the Steve Burden lab at NYU (New York) where she unravelled the mechanism by which IgG4 MuSK autoantibodies cause myasthenia gravis. During her post doc she investigated the therapeutic potential of FcRn inhibition on MuSK myasthenia gravis and continued her work on neuromuscular autoimmune diseases at LUMC which escalated into the neuroimmunology group. Maartje has received fellowships from EMBO, NWO, LUMC, Health Holland, and Prinses Beatrix Spierfonds to support this work.
Currently, the translational research in her group, in close collaboration with clinicians, focusses on understanding the cause and consequences of (IgG4) autoantibodies and B cells and their characteristics in these autoimmune diseases. The ultimate ambition being to either prevent or cure the onset of IgG4 autoimmune (neuromuscular) diseases. Together with a pharmaceutical partner, one therapeutic which stems from her own research, is anticipated to start phase I clinical trial beginning of 2023.