Award: Arthritis and Related Autoimmune Disease Research Grant
Biography: Siva Kasinathan, MD, PhD is a physician-scientist in the Division of Pediatric Allergy, Immunology, and Rheumatology at the Stanford University School of Medicine and Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford. Clinically, he cares for children with rheumatic diseases. Siva’s basic and translational research bridges genetics, epigenomics, and immunology. Siva completed combined MD-PhD training at the University of Washington, Seattle, where he pioneered several genome-scale methods for epigenome profiling. During his clinical training in pediatrics and rheumatology at Stanford, Siva continued develop genomic technologies, this time with a focus on single-molecule sequencing. Siva’s current research involves applying sensitive new methods for analyzing immunogenetic variation in lupus, arthritis, and other immune-mediated diseases. As a physician-scientist, he is committed integrating clinical medicine and basic research to better understand the mechanisms of autoimmunity and translating this knowledge to improve outcomes for patients with rheumatic diseases.
Research Summary: Immune cells constantly get new mutations. We do not yet know if these mutations affect lupus, a disease where the immune system attacks the body. In my early-stage research, I found hundreds of mutations in immune cells from people with lupus. I also created tools for studying how these mutations affect cells. The main goal of this project is to understand how immune cells in lupus are influenced by mutations. This project has three parts: First, I will identify mutations in lupus immune cells across the whole genome. Second, I will study how these mutations affect the way DNA is organized in immune cells. Third, I will analyze single immune cells to see how gene activity and cell behavior are related to mutations. This project will improve our knowledge of mutations in immune cells in lupus. Future studies will focus on important mutations identified in this project. Overall, these findings will increase our understanding of the causes of lupus and lead to better treatments.
