When defensesturn inward.
Autoimmune disease is one of the largest unmet needs in modern medicine, and immunology now stands at the moment when that can change.
In autoimmune disease, the body's own defenses turn against it. Decades of immune science have brought us to the moment when that can change.
One of medicine's largest unmet needs.
140+
distinct conditions
~8%
of the U.S. population
~80%
of patients are women
200M+
affected worldwide
Autoimmune disease sits at the intersection of chronic illness, women's health, and biomedical innovation. It affects tens of millions of Americans across more than 140 conditions, yet many remain underdiagnosed, understudied, and without curative therapies.
A single system, many diseases.
The immune system exists to protect the body. In autoimmune disease it mistakes the body's own tissues for a threat. The result is more than 140 distinct conditions that look different in the clinic but share a common origin in immune biology.
- Type 1 diabetes
- Multiple sclerosis
- Lupus
- Rheumatoid arthritis
- Crohn's & colitis
- Psoriasis
- Scleroderma
- Sjögren's
- Celiac disease
- Vitiligo
A turning point in immunology.
Autoimmune medicine is entering a pivotal period, driven by advances that began in cancer immunotherapy. Two decades of investment turned immuno-oncology into one of the most successful areas of modern medicine. The same platforms are now being turned toward autoimmune disease, where the goal shifts from activating the immune system against cancer to calming, redirecting, and restoring it.
For decades, treating autoimmune disease meant broadly suppressing the immune system. The frontier now is precision: selectively restoring the body's tolerance to itself, through regulatory T cells and other mechanisms that teach the immune system to stand down without leaving patients defenseless.
Shared biology, shared progress.
Autoimmune diseases rarely exist in isolation. They frequently share genetic architecture, immune pathways, biomarkers, and therapeutic targets. A tolerance-inducing approach pioneered in type 1 diabetes may inform strategies in celiac disease or multiple sclerosis.
As the science converges, the greatest opportunity may lie not in any single disease, but in accelerating progress across the whole autoimmune landscape.
That connective tissue — the biology shared across diseases — is where the Foundation concentrates its work, alongside the organizations closest to each condition.
Where cross-disease work can help.
The Foundation concentrates on the connective tissue between diseases — the research and infrastructure that can benefit many autoimmune conditions at once. Illustrative areas include:
- Sex differences in autoimmune disease
- Translational biomarker development
- Cross-disease clinical research infrastructure
- Multidisciplinary models of care
- Patient-centered trial design
- AI to map shared mechanisms across diseases
- Academic collaborations linking discovery to the clinic
These examples are illustrative. Funding priorities are set together with the Foundation's scientific advisors and the disease foundations and patient organizations it works with.
Few moments in medicine have aligned the science, the technology, and the will to transform autoimmune disease. This is one of them.