My long standing research interest has involved understanding the genetic basis of susceptibility to autoimmune disease. More recently I have been involved in the establishment of the Cambridge Hinxton Centre for Translational Research in Autoimmune Disease. This is a collaboration between clinicians, basic scientists and bioinformaticians that aims to apply expression profiling to the clinical management of autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus and small vessel vasculitis. This approach will enable the development of novel biomarkers that can be used to stratify patients at presentation, select appropriate treatment protocols, monitor response and predict relapse. In addition, it may also provide insight into the molecular pathogenesis of disease.