ArticleCytokine2015
Cytokine expression provides clues to the pathophysiology of Gulf War illness and myalgic encephalomyelitis.
Article in Cytokine, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 52 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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.
The trial behind it
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
52 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 74 citations in OpenAlex.
- Biomarkers for myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS): a systematic review.BMC medicine · 2023Pooled it
- Exercise does not cause post-exertional malaise in Veterans with Gulf War Illness: A randomized, controlled, dose-response, crossover study.Brain, behavior, and immunity · 2024Trial
- Trial
- A Placebo-Controlled, Pseudo-Randomized, Crossover Trial of Botanical Agents for Gulf War Illness: Curcumin (International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Trial
- Cytokine signatures in chronic fatigue syndrome patients: a Case Control Study and the effect of anakinra treatment.Journal of translational medicine · 2017Trial
- Macrophage Immune-Competent Colon Assembloids for Functional Interrogation of Neuroinflammation-Induced Colonic Dysmotility.Gastro hep advances · 2026Article
- Investigating the Eye as a Biomarker of Gulf War Illness: Sphingolipid and Eicosanoid Composition in Tears and Plasma.Biomolecules · 2025Article
- Longitudinal Assessment of Ocular Biomarkers in Individuals With Gulf War Illness Symptoms.Military medicine · 2025Article
- Reactivation of Latent Herpesviruses and a Faulty Antiviral Response may Contribute to Chronic Multi-Symptom and Multi-System Illnesses in U.S. Military Veterans.Journal of medical virology · 2025Article
- Stabilization Splint Therapy for Patients with Temporomandibular Disorders Improves Opening Movements and Jaw Limitation and Attenuates Pain by Influencing the Levels of IL-7, IL-8, and IL-13 in the Gingival Crevicular Fluid.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2025Article
- The search for a blood-based biomarker for Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/ Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS): from biochemistry to electrophysiology.Journal of translational medicine · 2025Review
- Exposure to Gulf war illness-related chemicals exacerbates alcohol-induced liver damage in rodents.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Exposure to Gulf war illness-related chemicals exacerbates alcohol- induced liver damage in rodents.Research square · 2024Article
- Exposing the latent phenotype of Gulf War Illness: examination of the mechanistic mediators of cognitive dysfunction.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Review
- Mitochondrial impairment but not peripheral inflammation predicts greater Gulf War illness severity.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Exercise-induced changes in gene expression do not mediate post exertional malaise in Gulf War illness.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2023Article
- Pathophysiological basis and promise of experimental therapies for Gulf War Illness, a chronic neuropsychiatric syndrome in veterans.Psychopharmacology · 2023Review
- Ocular and inflammatory markers associated with Gulf War illness symptoms.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- ME/CFS and Long COVID share similar symptoms and biological abnormalities: road map to the literature.Frontiers in medicine · 2023Review
- Evaluation of delayed LNFPIII treatment initiation protocol on improving long-term behavioral and neuroinflammatory pathology in a mouse model of Gulf War Illness.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
10 authors at 4 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Gulf War illness (GWI) is a chronic disease of unknown etiology characterized by persistent symptoms such as cognitive impairment, unexplained fatigue, pervasive pain, headaches, and gastrointestinal abnormalities. Current reports suggest that as many as 200,000 veterans who served in the 1990-1991 Persian Gulf War were afflicted. Several potential triggers of GWI have been proposed including chemical exposure, toxins, vaccines, and unknown infectious agents. However, a definitive cause of GWI has not been identified and a specific biological marker that can consistently delineate the disease has not been defined. Myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME) is a disease with similar and overlapping symptomology, and subjects diagnosed with GWI typically fit the diagnostic criteria for ME. For these reasons, GWI is often considered a subgroup of ME. To explore this possibility and identify immune parameters that may help to understand GWI pathophysiology, we measured 77 serum cytokines in subjects with GWI and compared these data to that of subjects with ME as well as healthy controls. Our analysis identified a group of cytokines that identified ME and GWI cases with sensitivities of 92.5% and 64.9%, respectively. The five most significant cytokines in decreasing order of importance were IL-7, IL-4, TNF-α, IL-13, and IL-17F. When delineating GWI and ME cases from healthy controls, the observed specificity was only 33.3%, suggesting that with respect to cytokine expression, GWI cases resemble control subjects to a greater extent than ME cases across a number of parameters. These results imply that serum cytokines are representative of ME pathology to a greater extent than GWI and further suggest that the two diseases have distinct immune profiles despite their overlapping symptomology.
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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.