Inflammatory Diseases

This group is a multidisciplinary team: Our research aims are a) to study etiopathogenic mechanisms of immune-mediated diseases to develop tools to advance toward a more personalized medicine; b) to find biomarkers of response to immunotherapy treatments in cancer and chronic inflammatory diseases to select the most suitable drugs and to identify the patient population that can benefit from them; and c) to analyze the involvement of the immune system in the pathogenesis of autoimmune processes, immunodeficiencies, and immunosenescence.

Main lines of research

• The role of the immune system in the development and perpetuation of autoimmune, immune-mediated diseases and chronic inflammatory processes. (Vidal Alcorisa, Silvia).
• The immunological response associated with the clinical course during immunomodulatory therapies. (Vidal Alcorisa, Silvia).
• The involvement of autoantibodies, components of the adaptive immune system, in the pathogenesis of autoimmune processes. (Mariscal Rodriguez, Anais; Martinez Martinez, Laura).
• Mechanisms involved in immunodeficiency. (Martinez Martinez, Laura; de la Calle Martín, Oscar).
• Immunosenescence. (Franco Leyva, Teresa).
• Immunomodulatory mechanisms in hepatitis (Alvarado Tapias, Edilmar A.).

Scientific Challenges

• To understand the appearance and evolution of autoimmune events, immunodeficiencies, infections, and cardiovascular diseases to improve diagnosis tools.
• To decipher the immune response involved in the development or the control of tumors to discover new biomarkers of prognosis to immunotherapies.
• To elucidate biomarkers related to immune sense and susceptibility to infections.
• To characterize cellular immune responses in immunological disorders such as infections, hypersensitivity reactions, and immunodeficiencies.
• Different strategies were applied according to the goal and pathology:
  • To characterize cell populations in complex human biological fluids by multiparametric flow cytometry analysis complemented with dimensionality reduction and data visualization techniques.
  • To study the expression and dynamics of inflammatory mediators with advanced clustering analysis.
  • To identify new specificities of autoantibodies in subgroups of patients.
  • To study mechanisms involved in immunodeficiency caused by alterations of molecular components.
  • To identify new immunomodulator targets in hepatitis.

Contact

Silvia Vidal
svidal@santpau.cat