Expression of myosin-class II major histocompatibility complexes in the normal myocardium occurs before induction of autoimmune myocarditis.
Determining how an autoimmune response is initiated is essential to understanding the mechanisms of autoimmunity. Self-reactive T cells, self-protein, and a failure of tolerance to that self-protein are all involved in the pathogenesis of autoimmune disease; yet it is not clear how self-reactive T cells find the target self-protein to initiate an autoimmune response. Although a variety of self-proteins have been shown to be presented on both class I and class II major histocompatibility complex (MHC) molecules, the relationship of these self-proteins to autoimmune disease has not been established. To explore this further, we generated a T-cell hybridoma that recognizes mouse cardiac myosin, the self-protein that induces murine autoimmune myocarditis. Using this hybridoma as a probe to detect myosin-class II MHC complexes, we isolated a class II MHC+/CD45+ residential antigen-presenting cell (APC) population directly from the hearts of normal mice and looked for evidence of endogenous processing of cardiac myosin by these APC. In this report we show that myosin-class II MHC complexes are found on residential APC in the normal mouse heart. Induction of autoimmune myocarditis increased the expression of myosin-class II MHC in the heart and enhanced their APC functions. This result is a direct demonstration that epitopes of a self-antigen involved in initiating an autoimmune disease are endogenously processed and presented within the target organ.