Jane Buckner, M.D.

Dr. Buckner is an Assistant Member at the Benaroya Research Institute and Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Washington in the Division of Rheumatology. Dr. Buckner’s laboratory research has focused on immune regulation, the identification of autoantigens that are the targets of autoimmunity in human disease and the role T cells specific for these autoantigens play in autoimmunity. She has extensive experience with the use of MHC class II tetramers, T cell cloning and functional assays, including studies of regulatory T cells. Her work includes studies of type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and relapsing polychondritis. In addition to her laboratory research, Dr Buckner heads the Translational Research Program at BRI. This program was established to facilitate the acquisition of clinical data and samples from individuals with autoimmunity, in order to extend our knowledge of immunology and genetics to human subjects in the context of clinical trials.

Autoimmunity is due to an aberrant immune response in which recognition of self-proteins lead to inflammation and destruction of tissues. The immunologic events that lead to autoimmunity may occur at many levels; autoreactive T cells may escape thymic deletion, peripheral tolerance may be lost, or a pathologic skewing of the immune response may occur. Dr. Buckner's laboratory is examining several aspects of the immune response to better understand the mechanisms leading to autoimmunity. Her lab has three areas of focus:

1. To examine how antigen processing and presentation is influenced by the molecular differences between HLA DR alleles.
2. To identify factors that determine T cell commitment, cytokine response and fate, particularly in the rheumatoid joint.
3. To examine the autoimmune response directed toward cartilage autoantigens in patients with relapsing polychondritis and rheumatoid arthritis.

Assistant: Ellen Briggs ebriggs@benaroyaresearch.org