This grant application requests support for travel and expenses of fellows to attend the 2006 Clinical Immunology Society (CIS) School on Systemic Autoimmune Diseases. This grant application is requested to help defray travel costs for the U.S. fellows' travel and expenses to attend the School. Additional funding will be solicited from pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. ? ? This School will be an intensive 4-day residential course to be held in March 15-19, 2006 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The program will be advertised through academic program directors and members of the CIS, the American College of Rheumatology and the American Association of Allergy and Applied Immunology as well as through other major societies with interests in clinical immunology. Advertising emphasis will be given to attract applicants representing minorities. The topic of the School will be Systemic Autoimmune Diseases, geared toward fellows in training holding either an MD and/or a PhD, within their last years of fellowship training. The primary goal of the School is education on the diagnosis, pathogenesis, and treatment of systemic autoimmune diseases such as SLE, Scleroderma, Arthritis, and Vasculitis as well as gene therapy. ? ? These presentations will include topic overviews, state of the art established treatments, laboratory approaches, pathogenesis and future biology. Emphasis will be given to new treatments that are under development and future possibilities. Sufficient time will be allocated for fellows to present either interesting cases or their work. By the end of the School, participants should be able to better diagnose and treat systemic autoimmune diseases; have an enhanced awareness of clinical immunology processes as they relate to systemic autoimmune diseases and its importance in scientific discoveries and clinical application; and become ambitious in pursuing academic careers to further our understanding, diagnosis and treatment of human systemic autoimmune diseases. Lastly, the School should stimulate future collaborations between young investigators in different medical centers and countries, and between young investigators and experienced physician/scientists in the field. ? ? The School will be residential in character and held in an informal setting and will attract applicants from North America, Europe and Asia. There will be 10 faculty and 25 fellows selected to attend. ? ? ?
