ArticlePloS one2013
Isolation of Clostridium perfringens type B in an individual at first clinical presentation of multiple sclerosis provides clues for environmental triggers of the disease.
Article in PloS one, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 100 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
100 citing papers in PubMed, 205 citations in OpenAlex.
- Modulating the Gut Microbiome as a Therapeutic Approach in Multiple Sclerosis: Implications for Gut-Brain Interactions and Immune Pathways: A Narrative Review.Brain and behavior · 2026Review
- Farnesol, the farnesol pathway, and the immune-gut-brain axis.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2026Review
- Potential mechanisms linking bacterial factors to the development and progression of multiple sclerosis.Infectious medicine · 2025Review
- Article
- Gut Microbiota in a Viral Model of Multiple Sclerosis: Modulation and Pitfalls by Oral Antibiotic Treatment.Cells · 2025Article
- Prevalence of epsilon toxin-producing Clostridium perfringens isolates among patients with multiple sclerosis and neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder in Iran.BMC neurology · 2025Article
- Gut microbiota in multiple sclerosis and animal models.The FEBS journal · 2025Review
- Does Clostridium Perfringens Epsilon Toxin Mimic an Auto-Antigen Involved in Multiple Sclerosis?Toxins · 2025Observational
- Epsilon Toxin fromToxins · 2024Article
- In silico vaccine design: Targeting highly epitopic regions ofComputational and structural biotechnology journal · 2024Article
- The epsilon toxin from Clostridium perfringens stimulates calcium-activated chloride channels, generating extracellular vesicles in Xenopus oocytes.Pharmacology research & perspectives · 2024Article
- Review
- Multiple Sclerosis andBiomedicines · 2024Article
- The Molecular Architecture and Mode of Action ofToxins · 2024Review
- Gut microbiota and multiple sclerosis: a potential diagnostic and prognostic marker?Neurodegenerative disease management · 2024Article
- Article
- Impact of Disease-Modifying Therapies on Gut-Brain Axis in Multiple Sclerosis.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2023Review
- Review
- IsMultiple sclerosis (Houndmills, Basingstoke, England) · 2023Review
- Article
40 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
We have isolated Clostridium perfringens type B, an epsilon toxin-secreting bacillus, from a young woman at clinical presentation of Multiple Sclerosis (MS) with actively enhancing lesions on brain MRI. This finding represents the first time that C. perfringens type B has been detected in a human. Epsilon toxin's tropism for the blood-brain barrier (BBB) and binding to oligodendrocytes/myelin makes it a provocative candidate for nascent lesion formation in MS. We examined a well-characterized population of MS patients and healthy controls for carriage of C. perfringens toxinotypes in the gastrointestinal tract. The human commensal Clostridium perfringens type A was present in approximately 50% of healthy human controls compared to only 23% in MS patients. We examined sera and CSF obtained from two tissue banks and found that immunoreactivity to ETX is 10 times more prevalent in people with MS than in healthy controls, indicating prior exposure to ETX in the MS population. C. perfringens epsilon toxin fits mechanistically with nascent MS lesion formation since these lesions are characterized by BBB permeability and oligodendrocyte cell death in the absence of an adaptive immune infiltrate.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.