Twenty Years of the Lupus Erythematosus Cell

Excerpt

In November 1968 a symposium was held in Rochester, Minn., to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the discovery of the lupus erythematosus (LE) cell by Hargraves, Richmond, and Morton (1). The best testimony to the importance of their finding is that almost all the extensive clinical and laboratory investigation on lupus erythematosus since that date has been based on this single observation and the subsequent identification of the LE factor as an immunoglobulin (2). After 20 years, the cause of lupus erythematosus still remains a mystery, but recent immunopathologic studies of the glomerular lesion of this disease offer an attractive