A researcher funded by the Lupus Research Institute (LRI) has discovered an entirely new and powerful molecular switch that controls the inflammatory response of the immune system.

High urinary levels of certain molecules might have the potential to serve as biomarkers for a potentially life-shortening kidney ailment caused by the autoimmune disease lupus, UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers have found.

A genetic variation has been identified that increases the risk of two chronic, autoimmune inflammatory diseases: rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and systemic lupus erythematosus(lupus).

Applied Data Research Finds Regional Factors and Importance of Supplemental Indications Increase the Value of Alliances

A compound related to a drug used in humans to prevent organ-transplant rejection attacks a key biochemical process in the faulty immune cells of lupus-prone mice, suggesting a possible new approach to combating the disease, UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers have found.

Lupus is an autoimmune disease which produces antibodies causing injuries to the body’s cells and tissue. It makes the immune system go out of control and the organism attack healthy cells instead of the germs on them. This pathology, which affects more than 5 million people around the world, is more developed in women of fertile age between 15 and 44 years old.

A gene discovered by scientists at Wake Forest University School of Medicine has been linked to lupus and related autoimmune diseases. The finding, reported in the current issue of Nature Genetics, is the latest in a series of revelations that shed new light on what goes wrong in human cells to cause the diseases.

A promising new therapy for protecting the fertility of women with cancer and auto-immune diseases such as lupus was revealed at the 23rd annual conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology today (Tuesday 3 July 2007).

The prognosis for systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), an autoimmune disease that mainly affects women in their reproductive years, has improved recently, prompting a shift toward improving quality of life. For men with SLE, concerns have been raised about their future fertility.

Treatment with belimumab resulted in a sustained improvement of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE or lupus) disease activity in 46% of patients at week 52, according to a novel combined responder index in results presented today at EULAR 2007, the Annual European Congress of Rheumatology in Barcelona, Spain.

Inflammatory rheumatic disease and smoking independently predict aortic inflammation, suggests study of coronary artery surgery survivors

Rheumatology researchers have discovered that a well-known cell receptor sends a signal to dampen the immune system.