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In 1984, 2 pediatric neurologists, Jean Aicardi and Françoise Goutières, published their seminal case report of 8 patients (from 5 families) with a devastating neonatal encephalopathy characterized by striking cerebral calcifications, white matter hypodensities, visualized on CT, accompanied by a persistent CSF lymphocytosis.1 Notably, the neuroradiologic findings suggested a perinatal toxoplasmosis, other (syphilis, varicella-zoster, parvovirus b19), rubella, cytomegalovirus, and herpes (TORCH) infection, and these patients often have an elevation of interferon-α in the CSF.2,3 Three decades of highly productive clinical and scientific investigation of Aicardi-Goutières syndrome (AGS) has led to the discovery of 7 causative genes and the realization that mutation in any of these leads to a genetically mediated autoimmune response to nucleic acid metabolism, analogous to systemic lupus erythematosus, in the developing brain.4
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