Dilan Dissanayake

Immune disease is often the result of a complex interplay between genetic and environmental factors, making it challenging to isolate and study the relative role of each contributor.  An exception to this is the autoinflammatory diseases, a new class of inborn errors of immunity that are driven by dysregulation of the innate immune system, often due to single gene defects. Because the genetic variants are sufficient to drive disease on their own, these conditions represent a unique opportunity to isolate and study the most impactful molecular drivers of innate immune activation in disease.

The Dissanayake lab has a specific focus on using monogenic diseases to identify novel pathways that lead to inflammasome overactivation and interleukin-1 excess.  Using genetic sequencing, primary patient samples, and cellular modeling, the lab aims to discover new monogenic diseases, to characterize the underlying cellular and molecular pathology, and to thereby identify new biological targets for the screening, monitoring, and treatment of patients with autoinflammation.