Description

Behçet’s disease (BD) is a type of vasculitis with many distinctive clinical manifestations and multifactorial immunopathogenesis. The cause of BD remains unknown, but it has been postulated that in a genetically predisposed or susceptible population, exogenous agents trigger the dysregulation of both autoinflammatory and autoimmune responses resulting in multisystem vasculitis. There are robust ongoing efforts across the globe to elucidate and identify signature markers to improve and assist in rapid diagnosis of the disease and to tailor the best therapy accordingly. While association of human leukocyte antigen (HLA)-B*51 (B*51:01 subtype) allele is well recognized as the strongest genetic susceptibility gene so far among genetically predisposed BD patients, further investigations using the latest technology have led to the identification of several novel single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and other associated genes involved in the pathogenesis. There are several “established” cytokines known to be involved in the pathogenesis of BD, which have been further implicated in the genome-wide association studies (GWAS)-based cytokine/receptor gene loci studies, as well as numerous “novel” cytokines, which are currently being studied and identified. This chapter offers insights into current knowledge and thoughts regarding the future of biomarkers in BD.

Chapter