About the Authors

Anne Becker

Contributed equally to this work with: Anne Becker, Nicole Ludwig

Affiliation Department of Human Genetics, Universität des Saarlandes, Homburg, Germany

Nicole Ludwig

Contributed equally to this work with: Anne Becker, Nicole Ludwig

Affiliation Department of Human Genetics, Universität des Saarlandes, Homburg, Germany

Andreas Keller

Affiliation Siemens Healthcare, Erlangen, Germany

Björn Tackenberg

Affiliation Clinical Neuroimmunology Group, Department of Neurology, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Marburg, Germany

Christian Eienbröker

Affiliation Clinical Neuroimmunology Group, Department of Neurology, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Marburg, Germany

Wolfgang H. Oertel

Affiliation Clinical Neuroimmunology Group, Department of Neurology, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Marburg, Germany

Klaus Fassbender

Affiliation Department of Neurology, Universität des Saarlandes, Homburg, Germany

Eckart Meese

Affiliation Department of Human Genetics, Universität des Saarlandes, Homburg, Germany

Klemens Ruprecht

klemens.ruprecht@charite.de

Affiliation Department of Neurology, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Berlin, Germany

Competing Interests

The authors have read the journal's policy and have the following conflicts: One of the authors of this manuscript (AK) is an employee of Siemens Healthcare. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials. All other authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: AB NL AK EM KR. Performed the experiments: AB NL AK. Analyzed the data: AB NL AK BT EM KR. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: BT CE WHO KF EM KR. Wrote the paper: KR NL AK BT.