National Psoriasis Foundation awards $450,000 in research grants

Six of the top scientists studying psoriasis—the most common autoimmune disease in the country, affecting 7.5 million Americans—and psoriatic arthritis, an inflammatory joint and tendon disease affecting up to 30 percent of people with psoriasis, received National Psoriasis Foundation (NPF) research grants totaling $450,000 for projects that aim to discover new treatments and a cure for these chronic diseases.

"National Psoriasis Foundation is dedicated to increasing the number of scientists, dollars and projects dedicated to psoriatic diseases," said Randy Beranek, National Psoriasis Foundation president and CEO. "We are the only organization funding these types of promising research projects, each of which will move us faster toward finding a cure, which is our highest priority."

Learn about the NPF research grant program: http://www.psoriasis.org/research.

Theoharis Theoharides, M.D., Ph.D., professor of pharmacology at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston, received a two-year, $200,000 Translational Research Grant to take laboratory findings and translate them into real-world applications to manage health. Dr. Theoharides will explore how stress contributes to psoriasis and how molecules derived from chamomile might interrupt this psoriasis-stress connection.

Additionally, five researchers each received a one-year, $50,000 Discovery Grant for early-stage research to advance basic understanding of psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis.

Provided by National Psoriasis Foundation