COMPLEMENT DEFICIENCY AND IMMUNE-COMPLEX DISEASE

Study of patients with complement deficiency has supplied important insights into the physiological importance of this component of the innate immune system. The most surprising finding to emerge from the study of such patients is the strong link between deficiencies of classical pathway proteins and susceptibility to SLE. This observation has stimulated many studies into the relationship between the complement system and processing mechanisms for immune complexes, which we have reviewed in this chapter. Although it is clear that complement deficiency is associated with several abnormalities of immune complex processing in vivo, the challenge still remains to provide a convincing link between these and the development of SLE. © 1994 Springer-Verlag.