Autoimmune Life Blog

The prestigious NIH Director’s New Innovator Award provides significant funding for innovative research that holds the promise of high rewards. And BRI geneticist John Ray, PhD, just received one.

When Jessica Hamerman, PhD, was perusing research papers in 2021, one discovery stopped her in her tracks — and ultimately put her on a whole new research path.

This giving season, on behalf of our team, I extend a heartfelt thank you to all BRI donors and share some of the meaningful ways your philanthropy supports our work.

To better treat — and even prevent — autoimmune diseases, we need to know exactly what causes them. Scientists have long known that genetics play a role in these diseases but are still working to understand how and why.

Every human has almost exactly the same DNA. But about 0.1 percent of human DNA is variable. This tiny percentage drives a surprising number of unique qualities in humans, from hair and eye color to our metabolism and immune responses.