Project

Chronic inflammatory diseases (CID) are clinically heterogeneous conditions that share common inflammatory pathways and derive from aberrant immune responses. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) demonstrated that Th17 cells play a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of these diseases and several loci involved in the IL-23/IL-17 are associated with the CID (IL23R, IL12B, IL6R, IL1R2, RORC, RUNX3, TYK2, JAK2, CARD9). IL-23 is important for the expansion and the functional activity of the Th17 cell subset and several studies have suggested that IL-23 may also regulate the function of IL-17-producing innate immune cells, which express the IL-23 receptor (IL-23R). The overall goal of this project is to improve our understanding of the so-called “IL-23/IL-17 axis” in the pathophysiology of CID and in particular to understand the effects of IL-23 on distinct cell populations and how is the expression of the IL-23 receptor regulated.