B cells as drivers towards clinical SLE manifestation

In SLE patients and mouse models, autoantibodies are present long before clinical manifestations. In that regard the focus of my project is to look into the pre-disease state of SLE. To answer that question, I would track the progression and tissue localization of (autoreactive) B cell/PC populations and changes in their antibody isotypes in lupus-prone mice and perform several functional studies to investigate the consequences on the disease pathogenesis at an early stage.