Immunogenetics

Groups focused on immunogenetics at the Wellcome Sanger Institute use a range of high-throughput assays such as genome sequencing, RNA sequencing (bulk and single cell) and ATAC-seq to understand cell-cell interactions, map genetic variants to functional cellular effects, determine the biological basis of human disease and identify new drug targets. Diseases of interest include inflammatory bowel disease, systemic lupus erythematosus and primary immunodeficiencies with research focused on the genetic and molecular basis of variation in disease susceptibility, progression and response to treatment. Large functional genomics datasets are also generated for cohorts of healthy individuals (with and without in vitro stimulation) to provide the spectrum of phenotypic variation that is naturally observed for traits such as blood cell traits that are relevant to inflammatory and immune diseases. Representation from both the Cellular Genetics and Human Genetics Programmes at Sanger provides resolution from the cellular mapping of immune cells to the genetic basis of variability in immune traits at the population level.