Patent ID: 8410053

Claim:
A method for treating an autoimmune disease in an animal, comprising administering to said animal a composition comprising one or more inhibitors of DPIV in an amount sufficient to suppress the immune system to treat said autoimmune disease, wherein said autoimmune disease is selected from the group consisting of multiple sclerosis, systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), myasthenia gravis, Grave's disease, and type II collagen-induced arthritis; and said inhibitor of DPIV is represented by the formula: wherein R 1 represents hydrogen, lower alkyl; R 2 represents a branched lower alkyl, cycloalkyl, or cycloalkylalkyl; R 3 represents hydrogen; R 4 represents hydrogen, or a C-terminally linked naturally-occurring α-amino acid residue selected from the group consisting of glycine, alanine, valine, cysteine, leucine, isoleucine, serine, threonine, methionine, glutamic acid, aspartic acid, glutamine, asparagine, lysine, arginine, proline, histidine, phenylalanine, tyrosine, and tryptophan; W represents and Y 1 and Y 2 are, independently, OH, or connected via a ring having from 5 to 8 atoms in a ring structure.