Cellular Immune Responses in Autoimmune Thyroid Disease

Recent research in autoimmune thyroid disease (AITD) has largely focused on delineation of the autoantigens and their epitopes, but there is now renewed interest in the immunoregulatory properties of T cells, an understanding of which may explain the emergence of AITD in experimental settings. T cell recognition of autoantigens has shown considerable intra- and interindividual heterogeneity, and a mixed pattern of cytokine production indicates that both the Th1 and Th2 limbs of the helper T cell response are involved in all types of AITD. It is now clear that secretion of chemokines and cytokines within the thyroid accounts for the accumulation and expansion of the intrathyroidal lymphocyte pool, and that the thyroid cells themselves contribute to this secretion. The thyroid cells also produce a number of proinflammatory molecules which will tend to exacerbate the autoimmune process. Thyroid cell destruction in autoimmune hypothyroidism is dependent on T cell-mediated cytotoxicity with the likely additional effect of death receptor-mediated apoptosis.