MD TP11: Identification of "genetic biomarkers" for SLE

Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease that is usually preceded by a symptom-free phase characterized by the presence of antinuclear antibodies (ANAs) for up to several years. What suggests that ANAs could be used as a predictive biomarker for people at risk of developing SLE. However, ANAs are detectable in the sera of up to 5% of the normal healthy population and only less than 10% of them will end up developing SLE, thus diminishing the predictive value of ANA itself.

 

The aim of this study is to distinguish the genetic variants associated with ANA-positive healthy individuals and whether they overlap with the SLE-susceptibility SNPs. That set of SNPs will then be used in a long term study to develop a combined genomic/ANA predictive algorithm for SLE.

The results of this study are currently prepared for submission.