From risk to prevention: nutrition and early biomarker discovery in autoimmune diseases

The overarching goal of the Ph.D. project is to investigate the relationship between dietary habits and immune cell perturbations and to find new early disease biomarkers, in the context of MINDFUL (Microvesicles at the Intersection between Autoimmune Diseases, Food, and Unhealthy Lifestyles) project. The exploration of diet as a protective/risk factor for AD started from the development of innovative nutritional epidemiology tools and large database interrogation. Literature reviews underscored gaps in tools to assess complex dietary patterns like the Western diet (WD) and emphasized the significance of nutrition in inflammation, aging, and immune-mediated diseases. To address these gaps, a new tool, MEDOC, was developed to investigate the impact of complex dietary patterns on autoimmunity. Additionally, studies using the UK Biobank revealed protective effects of certain foods against RA and MS, shedding light on potential dietary interventions. Secondly, multiparametric flow cytometry analysis was useful to identify disease-specific cellular trains for biomarker discovery in T1D. An increase in memory regulatory T cells (Tregs memory) in patients and the absence of correlation with biological age, observed in patient’s sibilings and healthy controls, may suggest a role of this population in disease onset , possibly involving an accelerated aging of the immune system. Moving forward, the integration of data through artificial intelligence will facilitate the exploration of unforeseen connections between autoimmune-specific cell traits and environmental factors, potentially offering insights applicable to various ADs.