Developing New Therapeutic Targets for Psoriasis

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For Immediate Release: August 20, 2013

The Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) has received a five year, $1.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases to study the development of psoriasis, and to evaluate molecules that have the potential to prevent psoriatic symptoms and that could be models for drug development.

Sam T. Hwang, M.D., the Thomas J. Russell Family / Milwaukee Community Dermatologists Professor and Chair of Dermatology, is the primary investigator of the grant. Dr. Hwang is also a practicing dermatologist at Froedtert Hospital. Brian F. Volkman, PhD, Professor of Biochemistry, is a collaborator and co-investigator on the project.

Psoriasis is a chronic disease of the immune system typified by areas of skin thickening, scaling and cracking. Up to three percent of the world’s population is affected, and there is no cure for the lifelong condition, which can also involve painful psoriatic arthritis.

In this project, Dr. Hwang and his collaborators will investigate molecules that allow the movement of immune cells into the skin tissue when the skin is immunologically activated. He has previously shown that deletion of the gene for a chemokine receptor called CCR6, which works with a protein called CCL20, prevents the onset of psoriatic symptoms in mice.

This project builds upon work funded by a 2012 National Psoriasis Foundation Lutto Translational Grant. The researchers will use novel computational methods to model the structure of important binding sites within the CCR6 and CCL20 molecules in order to rapidly identify and then validate potential drugs. Through this marriage of structural and computational biology, drugs may be identified that would be used to treat not only psoriasis but possibly other autoimmune diseases that rely on the CCR6 /CCL20 pathway.

About the Medical College of Wisconsin

The Medical College of Wisconsin is the state’s only private medical school and health sciences graduate school. Founded in 1893, it is dedicated to leadership and excellence in education, patient care, research and community engagement. More than 1,200 students are enrolled in the Medical College’s medical school and graduate school programs. A major national research center, it is the largest research institution in the Milwaukee metro area and second largest in Wisconsin. In FY 2011 – 12, faculty received more than $166 million in external support for research, teaching, training and related purposes, of which more than $152 million is for research. This total includes highly competitive research and training awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Annually, College faculty direct or collaborate on more than 2,000 research studies, including clinical trials. Additionally, more than 1,350 physicians provide care in virtually every specialty of medicine for more than 425,000 patients annually.

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