HMGB1 and autoimmune disease: Initial studies demonstrated that HMGB1 was a late mediator of sepsis; however, the recent publications and our data indicated that HMGB1 was associated with CD4+ T helper cell development [5,18], autoimmune diseases [19], cancer [20–22], trauma, ischaemia-reperfusion injury [23,24], tissue repair and regeneration [25,26] and cardiovascular diseases [27].