Lupus

In autoimmune disease, the immune system that should protect the body from infection, instead starts to attack the body. Sometimes a change in a single gene may cause lupus.

Dr Briggs research aims to understand genetic (inherited) factors which increase a person’s risk of developing autoimmune disease, particularly lupus.

Dr Briggs has identified genes that cause severe lupus in children. For families, gene discoveries can help provide a diagnosis, inform family planning and improve care. In the future she plans to study the effect of medicines in people who have rare genetic conditions to help find the best treatment for each patient and will continue to look for the genetic cause of disease in adults who have less rare forms of lupus.

Dr Briggs will us the Emerging Leaders prize funds to pay for staff salaries and for research consumables to help run more lab experiments and analyse complex genetic data.