Judith Ashouri Sinha, MD
Assistant Professor
Medicine
School of Medicine

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) afflicts millions globally, causing significant joint deformity, pain, and functional disability. RA is without cure and its cause is unknown, but CD4 T cells—immune cells widely accepted to play a key role in RA pathogenesis—from patients with RA become activated by proteins through their T cell receptor (called “antigen-specific T cells”) and cause arthritis.

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Dr. Ashouri’s research uses a unique tool to identify and characterize these antigen-activated T cells in both a mouse model of RA and human RA. Elucidating the contribution of these pathogenic CD4 T cells to arthritis development in RA holds promise for the discovery of improved therapeutic targets.

Awards

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• Arthritis National Research Foundation Scholar, Arthritis National Research Foundation, 2018-2020
• K Bridge Award, Rheumatology Research Foundation, 2017-2018
• Bechtel Junior Faculty Award, UCSF Division of Rheumatology, 2016-2019
• Scientist Development Award, Rheumatology Research Foundation, 2012-2015

Education & Training

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• Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Champion Training University of California 01/2022
• Fellowship Rheumatology University of California, San Francisco 06/2014
• Residency Internal Medicine Stanford University Hospital & Clinics 06/2011
• MD University of California, San Francisco 06/2008

Interests

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• Pathogenic T cell signaling in rheumatoid arthritis
• Rheumatology
• Autoimmunity
• Immunology

Websites

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• @@JudithAshouriMD on Twitter (twitter.com)

Grants and Projects

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• Signaling and repertoire differences in arthritogenic T cells, NIH, 2018-2023
• Decoding rheumatoid arthritis using a unique tool to identify arthritogenic T cells, Arthritis National Research Foundation (ANRF), 2018-2020

Publications (14)

Top publication keywords:
Th17 CellsNuclear Receptor Subfamily 4, Group A, Member 1Autoimmune DiseasesArthritis, ExperimentalArthritis, RheumatoidSynovial MembraneParaneoplastic SyndromesAntiphospholipid SyndromeLymphocyte ActivationRheumatic DiseasesProtein-Tyrosine KinasesCD4-Positive T-LymphocytesAutoimmunityReceptors, Antigen, T-CellVasculitis

• ZAP70, too little, too much can lead to autoimmunity.
  Immunological reviews 2021 Ashouri JF, Lo WL, Nguyen TTT, Shen L, Weiss A
• Cross-Tissue Transcriptomic Analysis Leveraging Machine Learning Approaches Identifies New Biomarkers for Rheumatoid Arthritis.
  Frontiers in immunology 2021 Rychkov D, Neely J, Oskotsky T, Yu S, Perlmutter N, Nititham J, Carvidi A, Krueger M, Gross A, Criswell LA, Ashouri JF, Sirota M
• The Therapeutic Landscape of Rheumatoid Arthritis: Current State and Future Directions.
  Frontiers in pharmacology 2021 Shams S, Martinez JM, Dawson JRD, Flores J, Gabriel M, Garcia G, Guevara A, Murray K, Pacifici N, Vargas MV, Voelker T, Hell JW, Ashouri JF
• Reporters of TCR signaling identify arthritogenic T cells in murine and human autoimmune arthritis.
  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 2019 Ashouri JF, Hsu LY, Yu S, Rychkov D, Chen Y, Cheng DA, Sirota M, Hansen E, Lattanza L, Zikherman J, Weiss A
• Endogenous Nur77 Is a Specific Indicator of Antigen Receptor Signaling in Human T and B Cells.
  Journal of immunology (Baltimore, Md. : 1950) 2016 Ashouri JF, Weiss A
• A sharp T-cell antigen receptor signaling threshold for T-cell proliferation.
  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 2014 Au-Yeung BB, Zikherman J, Mueller JL, Ashouri JF, Matloubian M, Cheng DA, Chen Y, Shokat KM, Weiss A

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• Therapeutic Implications of Diet in Inflammatory Bowel Disease and Related Immune-Mediated Inflammatory Diseases.
  Nutrients 2021 Jiang Y, Jarr K, Layton C, Gardner CD, Ashouri JF, Abreu MT, Sinha SR
• Developing Human Skin Contains Lymphocytes Demonstrating a Memory Signature.
  Cell reports. Medicine 2020 Dhariwala MO, Karthikeyan D, Vasquez KS, Farhat S, Weckel A, Taravati K, Leitner EG, Clancy S, Pauli M, Piper ML, Cohen JN, Ashouri JF, Lowe MM, Rosenblum MD, Scharschmidt TC
• Efficacy of Dietary Supplements in Inflammatory Bowel Disease and Related Autoimmune Diseases.
  Nutrients 2020 Jadhav P, Jiang Y, Jarr K, Layton C, Ashouri JF, Sinha SR
• A young woman with systemic lupus erythematosus and extensive mesenteric vasculitis involving small and medium vessels.
  Arthritis care & research 2012 Ashouri JF, Davis JL, Farkas A, Durack JC, Ramachandran R, Dall'Era M
• Rheumatic manifestations of cancer.
  Rheumatic diseases clinics of North America 2011 Ashouri JF, Daikh DI
• Transcriptional regulation of EGR-1 by the interleukin-1-JNK-MKK7-c-Jun pathway.
  The Journal of biological chemistry 2008 Hoffmann E, Ashouri J, Wolter S, Doerrie A, Dittrich-Breiholz O, Schneider H, Wagner EF, Troppmair J, Mackman N, Kracht M
• Androgens are protective in experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis: implications for multiple sclerosis.
  Journal of neuroimmunology 2004 Palaszynski KM, Loo KK, Ashouri JF, Liu HB, Voskuhl RR
• Estrogen receptor alpha mediates estrogen's immune protection in autoimmune disease.
  Journal of immunology (Baltimore, Md. : 1950) 2003 Liu HB, Loo KK, Palaszynski K, Ashouri J, Lubahn DB, Voskuhl RR