Kennedy Trust Senior Research Fellow Professor Adam Croft has been appointed as the new Versus Arthritis Chair of Rheumatology and Head of the Rheumatology Research group at the University of Birmingham. The appointment recognises Professor Croft’s wealth of experience in discovery and translational rheumatology research and his world-leading expertise in synovial tissue pathology in inflammatory arthritis.

Professor Croft will be hosting an inaugural lecture entitled ‘Restoring order to the joint: fibroblasts as cellular checkpoints of inflammation’ at 16:30-17:30 on Wednesday 6th March 2024. The lecture will be held online and in person at the University of Birmingham. For further details, please click here.

Fibroblasts are mesenchymal cells which make up the framework of all tissues of the body. It is now widely recognised that, alongside their structural function, fibroblasts play a lead role in the choreography of tissue inflammation. In chronic inflammatory diseases of the joints, such as rheumatoid arthritis or juvenile idiopathic arthritis, the lining of the joint (called the synovium) becomes inflamed, resulting in pain, swelling, restricted movement and damage to the bone and cartilage.

Although fibroblasts are the major constituent cell of the synovium, their role in arthritis has historically been overlooked. Rather than passive bystanders, Professor Croft and his team have shown that synovial fibroblasts are in fact, key effector cells in these diseases, mediating both inflammation and damage.

In his inaugural lecture, Professor Croft will discuss how fibroblasts are the conductors of the ‘immunological orchestra’, co-ordinating the inflammatory response in the joint, acting as checkpoints that either suppress or amplify inflammation to dictate the outcome of arthritis. Furthermore, his group’s discovery of different fibroblast subtypes with either pathological or regulatory functions is enabling the development of highly specific fibroblast-targeting therapies that aim to restore the diseased joint to its healthy state.

To learn more about Professor Croft’s appointment, please click here.