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Autoimmune Diseases
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Credit: NIAID

Scanning electron micrograph of a human T lymphocyte (also called a T cell) from the immune system of a healthy donor.

More than 80 diseases occur as a result of the immune system attacking the body’s own organs, tissues, and cells. Some of the more common autoimmune diseases include type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, and inflammatory bowel disease.
Although the causes of many autoimmune diseases remain unknown, a person’s genes in combination with infections and other environmental exposures are likely to play a significant role in disease development. Treatments are available for many autoimmune diseases, but cures have yet to be discovered.
Why Is the Study of Autoimmune Diseases a Priority for NIAID?
The chronic and debilitating nature of these diseases, which can lead to high medical costs and reduced quality of life, is a burden on patients and also affects their families and communities.
How Is NIAID Addressing This Critical Topic?
Although researchers have made considerable progress in understanding how the immune system causes organ, tissue, and cell injury in autoimmune diseases, much remains to be learned. By supporting a broad range of basic, preclinical, and clinical research in autoimmune diseases, NIAID enhances understanding of the causes of these diseases, the genetic factors that make people susceptible to them, and the regulatory mechanisms that control the production of self-destructive antibodies.
NIAID-supported research on autoimmune diseases focuses on the immunologic basis of disease, including developing a greater understanding of the fundamental immunologic principles underlying disease onset and progression, developing improved animal models of disease, developing improved diagnostic tools, and identifying and evaluating more effective immune-based treatment and prevention strategies.
To learn about risk factors for autoimmune diseases and current prevention and treatment strategies visit the Medline Plus autoimmune diseases site
(link is external)
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What's New
Latest News Releases

• Epstein-Barr Virus Protein Can “Switch On” Risk Genes for Autoimmune Diseases, April 16, 2018
  
• Islet Transplantation Improves Quality of Life for People with Hard-to-Control Type 1 Diabetes, March 21, 2018
  
• Stem Cell Transplant for Severe Scleroderma Improves Survival, Quality of Life , January 3, 2018
  

• NIAID Scientists Discover Rare Genetic Cause of Crohn’s Disease, March 27, 2018
  

• Rituximab for Treatment of Systemic Sclerosis-Associated Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension (SSc-PAH) Study
• Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (Lupus) Studies 
• Strategy to Prevent the Onset of Clinically-Apparent Rheumatoid Arthritis (StopRA) (link is external)