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Alopecia areata is an autoimmune disease that is mediated by a particular subset of cytotoxic T cells that attack hair follicles. The most well-established treatment, intralesional steroids, is not consistently effective.
A team from Columbia University studied mice that spontaneously develop alopecia areata, with histopathology nearly identical to that of alopecia areata in humans. The team found that T cells attack hair follicles using interferon-γ (IFN-γ) pathways, which, in turn, act through Janus kinases (JAK). This biochemistry matters: Two FDA-approved small-molecule inhibitors of JAK exist, because JAK are central to the pathology of myeloproliferative diseases. In these mice, systemic administration of JAK inhibitors prevented devel…