Aberrant Epigenetic Regulation in the Pathogenesis of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus and Its Implication in Precision Medicine

Abstract

Great progress has been made in the last decades in understanding the complex immune dysregulation in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), yet the efforts to pursue an effective treatment of SLE proved to be futile. The pathoetiology of SLE involves extremely complicated and multifactorial interaction among various genetic and epigenetic factors. Multiple gene loci predispose to disease susceptibility, and the interaction with epigenetic modifications mediated through sex, hormones, and the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis complicates susceptibility and manifestations of this disease. Finally, certain environmental and psychological factors probably trigger the disease via epigenetic mechanisms. In this review, we summarize and discuss recent epigenetic studies of SLE and suggest a personalized approach to the dissection of disease onset and therapy or precision medicine. We speculate that in the future, precision medicine based on epigenetic and genetic information could help guide more effective targeted therapeutic intervention.