Autoimmune inflammatory diseases occur in greater than five percent of the United States population; this disease group includes asthma, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, and lupus. Treatments generally include immunosuppressants or anti-inflammatory drugs, which can have serious side effects; recently, more specific immunomodulatory therapies such as TNF-alpha antagonists have been developed.

In experiments with mice, NIAMS inventors have shown that the interaction between the TNF family ligand TL1A with its receptor, DR3, is critical for development of disease in asthma, inflammatory bowel disease and multiple sclerosis. They have also developed anti-TL1A antibodies that prevent disease in mouse models of rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease.

This technology describes anti-mouse TL1A and anti-human TL1A monoclonal antibodies that may be useful for the development of diagnostics and therapeutics for autoimmune inflammatory disease, as well as methods of treating such disease by blocking the interaction between TL1A and DR3.