CD4 and autoimmune disease: The following major findings have emerged from the present study: (i) there is an extensive number of potentially autoreactive CD4 and CD8 T cell epitopes that are similar to peptides of mycobacterial antigens; (ii) the majority of such epitopes are similar to the antigens from the metabolic proteins of mycobacteria; (iii) a considerable number of promiscuous CD4 T cell epitopes could be detected; (iv) some of the identified antigens were corroborated with established autoimmune diseases linked with mycobacterial infection, thus validating the approach.