Award: Psoriatic Arthritis Research Grant
Biography: Nick Borcherding is a physician-scientist whose work bridges computational immunology and clinical pathology. He serves as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology and Immunology at Washington University School of Medicine, where his clinical practice focuses on human leukocyte antigen testing for transplantation, autoimmunity, and cancer immunotherapy. Nick’s research explores how the adaptive immune system encodes and recalls disease experiences. His work integrates single-cell sequencing, systems immunology, and machine learning to map immune diversity and predict clinical outcomes. A particular focus is on the use of innate and adaptive cellular barcodes, including mitochondrial genomes and immune receptor repertoires, to trace clonal relationships across tissues and disease states.
Research Summary: Psoriatic arthritis is a painful disease affecting 1.5 million Americans that causes permanent joint damage. Unlike other types of arthritis, there is no blood test for early diagnosis, so patients wait an average of two years before learning they have the disease. During this time, their joints are being damaged. Our immune system uses cells called T cells to fight infections, but in some people, specific T cells mistakenly attack the body’s own joints. Recent research found that people with psoriatic arthritis have specific “bad” T cells in their blood. We will develop a blood test to detect these harmful T cells using new technology that scans millions of T cells from a single blood sample. We will compare blood from individuals with psoriatic arthritis with that from healthy individuals and individuals with skin psoriasis without joint involvement. If successful, this could lead to a simple blood test that helps doctors diagnose psoriatic arthritis earlier, before permanent joint damage occurs.
Links:
https://pathology.wustl.edu/people/nicholas-borcherding-md-phd/