Carolina Chiale Selected to Receive Postdoctoral Award from Lupus Research Alliance

May 20, 2025

By Mario Aguilera

UC San Diego School of Biological Sciences’ Carolina Chiale, a postdoctoral scholar in Department of Molecular Biology Professor Elina Zúñiga’s laboratory, has been selected to receive an award from the Lupus Research Alliance.

Postdoctoral Scholar Carolina Chiale

Through the Empowering Lupus Research Program, Chiale will explore proteins called type one interferons (IFN-Is), which the immune system leverages to fight viruses and cancers. However, these same proteins can also contribute to the development of autoimmune diseases such as lupus, in which the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy tissues and cells. Chiale will evaluate the inhibition of plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs), which are specialized IFN-I producers, as a possible new way to counteract lupus.

The $200,000 postdoctoral award for “Identifying and targeting novel IFN-I regulators in pDCs for lupus therapy” begins in June. The project will address systemic lupus erythematosus, or SLE, a complex form of the disease known for widespread inflammation and damage to multiple organs. The research seeks to identify new approaches to regulate IFN production by pDCs in order to develop safer and more effective therapies for lupus by screening a library of chemical compounds.

Chiale’s research aims to improve the index of candidate drugs that treat lupus while minimizing adverse effects. Using chemical screening and translational and in vivo studies, the project seeks to uncover new therapeutic targets and approaches for addressing IFN modulation in lupus. “The outcomes have the potential to advance our understanding of pDC-driven immune dysregulation and pave the way for innovative treatments that address key limitations of current therapies,” notes the project abstract.

The award also includes critical mentoring resources from the Lupus Research Alliance. Chiale and other cohort members will meet once per year during the Alliance’s annual scientific conference, “Forum for Discovery,” which this year takes place in November in New York.

Recently, Chiale, Zúñiga and their colleagues published a study in Nature Communications and PNAS linking pDC-derived interferon production to metabolism and glucocorticoids, two findings that could help empower immune responses against infections and cancer or limiting interferons in autoimmune diseases.