Member of IL-12 family - IL-35 is produced by wide range of regulatory lymphocytes and plays a role in immune suppression.
[12] Studies in mice show the absence of either IL-35 chain from regulatory Tregs reduces the cells' ability to suppress inflammation.
Intraperitoneal injection of IL-35 in the tested subjects lowered expression of several factors linked to this disease (such as VEGF and its receptors, TNF-α).
[14] Another experiment performed on a mouse model of EAE has shown, that mice lacking IL-35-producing B cells are unable to recover from the T-cell mediated demyelination but are resistant to infection by pathogenic intracellular microbe Salmonella typhimurium.
[20] Elevated circulating IL-35 levels have been found in several human tumors such as acute myeloid leukemia,[21] pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma[22] and colorectal cancer.