Animal models

Abstract

Core Messages: Chronic autoinflammatory/autoimmune disorders typically are multifactorial in nature, requiring several components such as genetic susceptibility, immune system components, and environmental factors for expression. Appropriate experimental animal models have become an essential tool to delineate and dissect the relative contributions of these components. The spontaneous autoimmune vitiligo described in the Smyth-line chicken recapitulates the entire spectrum of clinical and biological manifestations of human vitiligo, providing a unique opportunity to examine processes prior to expression and throughout the progression of the disease. Induction of autoimmune vitiligo in the mouse by the administration of plasmids encoding melanocyte differentiation antigens in the context of stress/danger signals provides a defined in vivo model to examine immune recognition of melanocyte proteins. © 2010 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.