Liv Eidsmo Group

A third of the Swedish population lives with a chronic inflammatory skin disease, such as psoriasis, eczema and vitiligo. Liv Eidsmo’s Group is mapping the skin’s T cells to better understand why the diseases often recur at the same place.

The human skin forms a barrier to the external environment that is constantly exposed to colonizing microbiota, invasive pathogens, and allergens. The skin barrier is maintained by immune cells, but these cells are also implicated in common inflammatory diseases. In healthy skin, we have defined functionally distinct subsets of tissue resient memory T (Trm) cells based on their expression of the integrin CD49a, and we have characterised pathogenic Trm cells in vitiligo and psoriasis.

Current studies in our laboratory aim to understand how human Trm cells are formed and how these cells impact on their immediate environment. Ultimately, we want to normalise the Trm cell compartment in diseased skin.

Liv Eidsmo, professor, senior physician, liv.eidsmo@ki.se