Health
In lupus breakthrough, researchers say they may have found what causes the autoimmune disease
Scientists may have pinpointed a primary cause of lupus, a chronic autoimmune disease.
Researchers from Northwestern Medicine in Chicago and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston claim they have found a “molecular defect” that leads to systemic lupus erythematosus (known as lupus).
The study findings were published in the journal Nature on Wednesday.
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“Lupus is an autoimmune disease that at its core involves abnormal B cell activation and antibody production,” study author Deepak Rao, M.D., PhD, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a rheumatologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, told Fox News Digital via email.
“This B cell activation and antibody production requires help from T cells (white blood cells that are integral to immune system activity).”
Lupus is a chronic autoimmune disease in which the immune system attacks healthy tissue in the body, which causes inflammation and pain in the body. (iStock)
In the course of the research, the scientists tested the blood of 19 lupus patients and compared it to a control group of healthy individuals.
The people with lupus shared certain molecular changes that caused a “dramatic imbalance” in the types of T-cells they generate, according to Rao.
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This imbalance resulted in too many “harmful” T-cells — which cause cellular damage — and too few of the “helpful” type that are necessary for cell repair.
The researchers also identified a protein called interferon that promotes the excess accumulation of T cells, Rao said.
“We have known for many years that patients with lupus have too much interferon production, yet how interferon contributes to disease has been unclear,” he said.
“This study reveals a new potential therapeutic strategy to treat lupus.”
The study discovered that interferon contributes to the lupus disease by promoting the expansion of certain types of T cells and “amplifying pathologic T cell-B cell interactions,” Rao said.
The researchers also discovered that the activation of one specific protein, the aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AHR), can prevent T cells from developing into disease-causing cells.
Some 1.5 million Americans are living with lupus, with about 16,000 new cases each year, according to the Lupus Foundation of America, based in Washington, D.C. (iStock)
“This study reveals a new potential therapeutic strategy to treat lupus,” Rao said.
“We aim to use small molecule activators of AHR, directed specifically toward T cells, as a treatment to suppress the pathologic T cell response in lupus and reprogram those T cells toward other benign or protective functions.”
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This approach could potentially be safer and more effective than current broad immunosuppressive therapies because it targets the disease-causing cells, according to study co-author Jaehyuk Choi, M.D., PhD, an associate professor of dermatology and a Northwestern Medicine dermatologist.
“While we don’t know which patients this can best help, our data suggests it could potentially be broadly useful for all patients with lupus,” Choi told Fox News Digital in an email.
Industry experts weigh in
Dr. Mara Lennard Richard, scientific program officer at the Lupus Research Alliance in New York City, which partially funded the research, said the study provides hope to those who struggle with lupus symptoms.
“This research is very exciting, and we are intrigued by the findings, which may pave the way to a potential new treatment,” Richard told Fox News Digital via email.
Brooke Goldner, M.D., a California-based board-certified physician and creator of the Hyper-Nourishing Nutrition Protocol for Lupus Reversal, said that targeted immune therapy using T cells and B cells is a “new and exciting focus” in lupus research. (iStock/Dr. Brooke Goldner)
“However, lupus is a highly complex disease with many contributing factors, and more research is needed to confirm these results,” she went on.
“We believe that many new targets and treatments are needed to improve the lives of people living with lupus.”
Brooke Goldner, M.D., a California-based board-certified physician and creator of the Hyper-Nourishing Nutrition Protocol for Lupus Reversal, said that targeted immune therapy using T cells and B cells is a “new and exciting focus” in lupus research.
“We believe that many new targets and treatments are needed to improve the lives of people living with lupus.”
“If it is proven effective, it would present a far more specific way to medically attenuate the abnormal immune response in lupus patients than current medications that suppress immunity more broadly,” Goldner, who was not involved in the study, told Fox News Digital in an email.
“However, the effectiveness and possible side effects of these therapies are still unknown.”
It is still unclear how these abnormalities in the immune cells are triggered, she noted.
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“People with lupus are not born with symptoms of the disease, but they are triggered at some point in their lives, which leads to their diagnosis,” Goldner said.
“That leaves the question: Are their immune cells actually normal prior to the disease being triggered? Does this trigger then activate abnormal gene expression, which causes the creation of these abnormal immune cells?”
“If that is the case, then the immune treatments [the researchers] are proposing would still be considered a treatment, not a cure, unless they are going to turn off gene expression more specifically and permanently.”
Limitations of the study
The research was mainly performed in-vitro using cells from patients, Rao acknowledged.
“We do not yet know what will happen to the T cell response if activators of AHR are used in people, or how effective this strategy will be to improve symptoms of lupus,” he added.
Even so, the researchers are hopeful that this discovery will pave the way to advances in lupus treatment.
Lupus is more common among women between 15 and 44 years of age and people who are African American, Asian American, Hispanic/Latino, Native American, or Pacific Islander, according to experts in the field. (iStock)
“This study is an excellent example of how we can gain new, important insights into the pathways that contribute to disease by doing careful analyses of samples from patients with a disease,” Rao noted.
“This ‘human immunology’ approach provided both new insights into how T cells are regulated and a new idea for how to treat lupus.”
What to know about lupus
Lupus is a chronic autoimmune disease in which the immune system attacks healthy tissue in the body, which causes inflammation and pain in the body, according to the Lupus Foundation of America’s website.
The disease most often affects the joints, skin and major organs, such as the kidneys and heart.
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Common symptoms include joint pain, extreme fatigue or a butterfly rash.
There are four different types of lupus, as detailed on the foundation’s website.
A facial “butterfly rash” is one of the hallmark symptoms of lupus. (iStock)
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), the most common form, affects multiple organs or organ systems.
Cutaneous lupus only affects the skin, while drug-induced lupus is triggered by specific prescription drugs.
Neonatal lupus is a rare condition that is passed from a pregnant woman to her infant.
Some 1.5 million Americans are living with lupus, with about 16,000 new cases each year, according to the Lupus Foundation of America, based in Washington, D.C.
Lupus can run in families, and it’s also more common among women between 15 and 44 years of age and people who are African American, Asian American, Hispanic/Latino, Native American, or Pacific Islander, according to the same foundation.
In addition to medication, lupus patients can manage their illness with certain lifestyle behaviors, such as eating an anti-inflammatory diet and managing emotional stress, an expert said. (iStock)
In addition to medication, lupus patients can manage their illness with certain lifestyle behaviors, Goldner said, such as eating an anti-inflammatory diet and managing emotional stress.
“The field of lifestyle medicine has shown that symptoms can be reversed long-term using lifestyle modification,” she said.
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“It would be extremely interesting to have researchers evaluate the activity of these abnormal immune cells before and after lifestyle modification to see whether it has manifested a similar reversal of the activity of these abnormal B cells without using the more invasive medical treatment.”
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What if your New Year’s resolution could fit inside a tote bag? Social media users are trying the “analog bag” trend, replacing phones with offline activities.
The trend is widely credited to TikTok creator Sierra Campbell, who posted about her own analog bag — containing a crossword book, portable watercolor set, Polaroid camera, planner and knitting supplies — and encouraged followers to make their own.
Her video prompted many others to share their own versions, with items like magazines, decks of cards, paints, needlepoint and puzzle books.
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“I made a bag of non-digital activities to occupy my hands instead of the phone,” said Campbell, adding that the practice has significantly cut her screen time and filled her life with “creative and communal pursuits that don’t include doom-scrolling.”
“I created the analog bag after learning the only way to change a habit is to replace it with another,” she told Fox News Digital.
Social media users are trying the “analog bag” trend, replacing phones with offline activities like cameras, notebooks and magazines. (Fox News Digital)
The science of healthier habits
Research on habit formation supports the idea of the analog bag, according to Dr. Daniel Amen, a California-based psychiatrist and founder of Amen Clinics.
“Your brain is a creature of habit,” Amen said during an interview with Fox News Digital. “Neurons that fire together wire together, meaning that every time you repeat a behavior, whether it’s good or bad, you strengthen the neural pathways that make it easier to do it again.”
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Studies show that habits are automatic responses to specific cues — such as boredom, stress or idle time — that typically deliver some kind of reward, according to the doctor. When no alternative behavior is available, people tend to fall back on the same routine, often without realizing it.
Research suggests that replacing an old habit with a new one tied to the same cue is more effective than trying to suppress the behavior altogether.
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“[When] cutting out coffee — you need to have another drink to grab for, not just quit cold turkey. It’s how the pathways in our brains work,” Campbell said.
By substituting a different routine that still provides stimulation and engagement, people can gradually weaken the original habit and build a new automatic response.
Substituting another activity instead of scrolling on your phone can help quell the impulse to reach for it. (iStock)
“Simply stopping a behavior is very challenging,” Amen said. “Replacing one habit with something that is better for your brain is much easier. That’s how lasting change happens, one step at a time.”
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If alternatives are within arm’s reach, people will be more likely to use them, the doctor said. “Your brain does much better with small, simple actions than big, vague intentions.”
Instead of saying, “I’ll stop scrolling today,” the doctor recommends choosing a small habit you can do in a few moments in specific situations, like knitting 10 rows of a scarf on your commute or reading a few pages of a book while waiting at the doctor’s office.
“If alternatives are within arm’s reach, you’re more likely to use them,” a brain doctor said. “Your brain does much better with small, simple actions than big, vague intentions.” (iStock)
Campbell shared her own examples of how to use an analog bag. At a coffee shop with friends, she said, she might pull out a crossword puzzle and ask others to help with answers when the conversation lulls.
Instead of taking dozens of photos on her phone, she uses an instant camera, which limits shots and encourages more intentional moments.
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In casual outdoor settings, such as a park or winery, she brings a small watercolor set for a quick creative outlet.
“It’s brought so much joy,” Campbell said of the analog bag trend, “seeing how it resonates with so many.”
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A deadly, drug-resistant fungus already spreading rapidly through U.S. hospitals is becoming even more threatening worldwide, though there may be hope for new treatments, according to a new scientific review.
Candida auris (C. auris), often described as a “superbug fungus,” is spreading globally and increasingly resisting human immune systems, Hackensack Meridian Center for Discovery and Innovation (CDI) researchers said in a review published in early December.
The findings reinforce prior CDC warnings that have labeled C. auris an “urgent antimicrobial threat” — the first fungal pathogen to receive that designation — as U.S. cases have surged, particularly in hospitals and long-term care centers.
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Approximately 7,000 cases were identified across dozens of U.S. states in 2025, according to the CDC, and it has reportedly been identified in at least 60 countries.
Candida auris is a drug-resistant fungus spreading in hospitals worldwide. (Nicolas Armer/Picture Alliance via Getty Images)
The review, published in Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews, helps explain why the pathogen is so difficult to contain and warns that outdated diagnostics and limited treatments lag behind. It was conducted by Dr. Neeraj Chauhan of the Hackensack Meridian CDI in New Jersey, Dr. Anuradha Chowdhary of the University of Delhi’s Medical Mycology Unit and Dr. Michail Lionakis, chief of the clinical mycology program at the National Institutes of Health.
Their findings stress the need to develop “novel antifungal agents with broad-spectrum activity against human fungal pathogens, to improve diagnostic tests and to develop immune- and vaccine-based adjunct modalities for the treatment of high-risk patients,” the researchers said in a statement.
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“In addition, future efforts should focus on raising awareness about fungal disease through developing better surveillance mechanisms, especially in resource-poor countries,” they added. “All these developments should help improve the outcomes and prognosis of patients afflicted by opportunistic fungal infections.”
Candida auris can survive on skin and hospital surfaces, allowing it to spread easily. (iStock)
First identified in 2009 from a patient’s ear sample in Japan, C. auris has since spread to dozens of countries, including the U.S., where outbreaks have forced some hospital intensive care units to shut down, according to the researchers.
The fungus poses the greatest risk to people who are already critically ill, particularly those on ventilators or with weakened immune systems. Once infected, about half of patients may die, according to some estimates.
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Unlike many other fungi, C. auris can survive on human skin and cling to hospital surfaces and medical equipment, allowing it to spread easily in healthcare settings.
“It is resistant to multiple antifungal drugs, and it tends to spread in hospital settings, including on equipment being used on immunocompromised and semi-immunocompromised patients, such as ventilators and catheters,” Dr. Marc Siegel, Fox News senior medical analyst and clinical professor of medicine at NYU Langone, previously told Fox News Digital.
Scientists say the unique cell wall structure of C. auris makes it harder to kill. (iStock)
It is also frequently misdiagnosed, delaying treatment and infection control measures.
“Unfortunately, symptoms such as fever, chills and aches may be ubiquitous, and it can be mistaken for other infections,” Siegel said.
In September, he said intense research was ongoing to develop new treatments.
Only four major classes of antifungal drugs are currently available, and C. auris has already shown resistance to many of them. While three new antifungal drugs have been approved or are in late-stage trials, researchers warn that drug development has struggled to keep pace with the fungus’s evolution.
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Despite the sobering findings, there is still room for cautious optimism.
The fungus can cling to skin and hospital surfaces, aiding its spread. (iStock)
In separate research published in December, scientists at the University of Exeter in England discovered a potential weakness in C. auris while studying the fungus in a living-host model.
The team found that, during infection, the fungus activates specific genes to scavenge iron, a nutrient it needs to survive, according to their paper, published in the Nature portfolio journal Communications Biology in December.
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Because iron is essential for the pathogen, researchers believe drugs that block this process could eventually stop infections or even allow existing medications to be repurposed.
“We think our research may have revealed an Achilles’ heel in this lethal pathogen during active infection,” Dr. Hugh Gifford, a clinical lecturer at the University of Exeter and co-author of the study, said in a statement.
New research is underway to develop better treatments and diagnostics for C. auris. (iStock)
As researchers race to better understand the fungus, officials warn that strict infection control, rapid detection and continued investment in new treatments remain critical.
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Health experts emphasize that C. auris is not a threat to healthy people.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the CDI researchers and additional experts for comment.
Fox News Digital’s Angelica Stabile contributed reporting.
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