Immunology, Rheumatology and Infectious Diseases

Head of Research Area 
Fabrizio De Benedetti

The activity of the research Area is centred on the immunological aspects of autoimmune and infectious diseases. The research areas in which the Area is engaged concern the study of cellular mechanisms in rheumatological Diseases and their treatments, Immunodeficiencies, vaccines, diagnosis and treatment of food Allergies. 

The Area specifically deals with identifying the predictive markers and pathogenetic mechanisms to identify the best therapeutic strategies in rheumatological Diseases, the cells of innate immunity and their relative impact in tumoral, autoimmune and inflammatory diseases, studies the function of B Lymphocytes in response to infections or vaccinations in order to understand their organization, function and maintenance over time. 

Management of a systems biology platform is active in the Area, to identify new biomarkers capable of predicting the response of new drugs capable of producing changes in the immune system, it deals with translating protocols based on second-generation sequencing technologies generation (NGS) to speed up the diagnosis of primary immunodeficiencies.

The activity of the Immunology, Rheumatology and Infectious Diseases Research Area is also aimed at developing and applying bioinformatics algorithms for the creation of maps of pediatric microbiomes, to study the functions and structure of proteins in food matrices on a large scale.

Lastly, it carries out clinical trials on rare respiratory diseases, evaluates innovative therapies aimed at reducing the “off-label” use of drugs in Pediatrics and identifies the factors that favor the development of tuberculous and non-tuberculosis mycobacterial diseases.