Elucidation of mechanisms that restrict the activation of Toll-Like Receptors and the IL-1 receptor to prevent inflammatory and autoimmune diseases

免疫系统对于抵御细菌和病毒等微生物病原体至关重要，但如果它被激活得太强或不能有效地关闭，它可能会导致严重的组织损伤，并导致许多炎症性和自身免疫性疾病。这些疾病包括关节炎、哮喘、结肠炎、纤维化、狼疮、牛皮癣和败血症，这些疾病影响着数百万人的生活。因此，不仅要了解启动免疫系统的机制，还要了解那些防止免疫系统被强烈激活的机制，以及那些在不再需要免疫系统时再次关闭它的机制。我们的研究提案建立在我们的研究团队最近取得的新颖和令人兴奋的发现的基础上，这些发现促进了对免疫系统如何保持控制和关闭的理解。从长远来看，我们的研究可能会带来治疗炎症性和自身免疫性疾病的改进药物的开发。它还可能有助于治疗某些形式的癌症，因为免疫系统在帮助摧毁导致癌症的肿瘤细胞方面发挥着关键作用。考虑到这些目标，我们正在努力，大学研究人员和制药公司将推出并加快开发针对我们研究确定的关键控制蛋白的新药来治疗这些疾病。

The immune system is vital for defense against microbial pathogens, such as bacteria and viruses, but if it is activated too strongly or cannot be switched off efficiently, it can cause serious tissue damage and lead to many inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. These diseases include arthritis, asthma, colitis, fibrosis, lupus, psoriasis and sepsis, which affect the lives of millions of people. It is therefore critical to not only understand the mechanisms that switch on the immune system, but also those that prevent it from being activated to strongly and those that switch it off again when it is no longer needed. Our research proposal builds on novel and exciting recent findings made by our research teams, which have advanced the understanding of how the immune system is kept under control and switched off. In the longer term, our research may lead to the development of improved drugs to treat inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. It may also help to treat some forms of cancer because the immune system has a key role in helping to destroy the tumour cells that cause cancer. With these aims in mind, we are working will both University researchers and pharmaceutical companies to launch and accelerate the development of new medicines to treat these diseases that target key controller proteins that our research has identified.