A Year of Momentum in Lupus Science, With Teodora Staeva, Ph.D.

Teodora Staeva, Ph.D.

Credit: Lupus Research Alliance

For people living with lupus, progress can sometimes feel incremental, but 2025 marked a year of meaningful scientific momentum. From new treatment approvals to deeper insights into how lupus begins and progresses, researchers made important strides toward more precise, patient-centered care. These advances are changing not just what scientists understand about lupus but how future treatments may be tailored to individuals.

In an interview with The Educated Patient, Teodora Staeva, Ph.D., chief scientific officer of the Lupus Research Alliance (LRA), reflects on the most significant lupus research breakthroughs of 2025 and what they could mean for patients now and in the years ahead.

Looking back at 2025, what do you see as the most significant scientific advances in lupus research this year?

Teodora Staeva, Ph.D.: The promising data on, and ultimate approval of, obinutuzumab (Gazyva) for lupus nephritis represent a significant advancement this year. The pivotal clinical trial demonstrated that a Type II anti‑CD20 antibody can improve complete renal response when combined with standard therapy for lupus nephritis and that deeper B-cell depletion is a more effective therapeutic approach than rituximab (first generation anti-CD20 antibody).

Another critical area of progress is the rapid expansion and use of large-scale molecular data initiatives, which are accelerating the shift toward precision medicine. The generation of large, curated data sets enables the discovery of novel biomarkers, patient stratification by disease subtype and the tailoring of more effective therapies. In 2025, the Lupus Research Alliance launched the Lupus Nexus Foundational Analyses, which aim to seed the generation of comprehensive molecular data sets within Lupus Nexus that integrate -omics, clinical and patient-reported data.

How has our understanding of lupus biology and immune system pathways evolved recently, and why does that matter for patients?

TS: A recent landmark example of our deepened understanding of lupus, particularly how immune dysregulation intersects with environmental triggers, is a study by William Robinson, M.D., Ph.D., funded by the LRA and published in Science Translational Medicine. Robinson‘s work established a compelling mechanistic link between Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection and lupus onset, advancing the field from association toward causation and offering insight into how lupus may initiate and persist.

For individuals with lupus, this is a major finding, as understanding disease origins enables prevention strategies, earlier diagnosis and therapies that target root causes rather than symptoms alone.

The Lupus Research Alliance recently announced the Mechanistic Clinical Award. How does this initiative represent a pivotal step toward advancing precision medicine in lupus?

TS: The Lupus Research Alliance Mechanistic Clinical Award (MCA) was established on the premise that a deeper mechanistic understanding of new and existing interventions will ultimately enable a more targeted, personalized and precision-based approach to patient care. This award funds mechanistic, proof-of-principle clinical studies designed to uncover the biological basis of how interventions work, thereby enabling the "matching" of therapies to the patients most likely to benefit.

For instance, one of the inaugural MCA awardees, Victoria Werth, MD, is investigating the mechanism of action of the drug quinacrine and why some individuals with cutaneous lupus respond more effectively to it than to hydroxychloroquine. Results from this study could aid health care providers in making more informed treatment decisions for individuals with cutaneous lupus.

Importantly, the MCA recipients will leverage key LRA infrastructure, including the Lupus Nexus, an unparalleled platform for the collection, exchange, and analysis of patient samples and data, and the Lupus Clinical Investigators Network (LuCIN), a North America-based lupus clinical trials network of 62 top academic research medical centers, to accomplish their goals.

What trends in global collaboration among lupus research institutions have you observed this year, and how are they accelerating progress?

TS: We are seeing increasing levels of global collaboration, including through initiatives like the Lupus Research Alliance‘s Global Team Science Award. This effort brings together investigators across continents to study lupus in diverse populations. Access to larger, more representative patient cohorts enables increased sample availability, more robust and diverse data sets reflecting the lupus population, and ultimately more powerful science. This global approach allows us to build a more complete picture of lupus biology, one that reflects the full heterogeneity of the disease and accelerates discovery for all patients.

We are also seeing a major need to cultivate emerging talent on a global stage. One way we‘re answering that call is by partnering with the European Lupus Society (SLEuro) to support a mentorship program established and administered by SLEuro — helping young physicians strengthen their clinical and/or research skills, expand their expertise and build a meaningful network of scientific contacts in lupus. By doing this, we‘re working to bolster the next generation of lupus investigators globally. 

Looking ahead, what are you most optimistic about for lupus research and treatment in the coming year?

TS: I am particularly optimistic about the momentum around immune-resetting therapies, including approaches inspired by recent advances in cell therapy. These strategies have opened the door to entirely new avenues to lupus treatment and the hope for potentially lasting, drug-free remission. The next wave of these innovative technologies, focused on alternative targets, improved manufacturing methods and safer, more accessible delivery models, has the potential to make these therapies more scalable and available to the broader lupus community.

To help further the research momentum in lupus, the Lupus Research Alliance recently launched a new philanthropic venture investment arm, Lupus Ventures. As the only venture fund dedicated to lupus, Lupus Ventures aims to fund innovative translational approaches with potential to improve standard of care. As such, the fund hopes to deliver meaningful value to the millions of people living with lupus worldwide.

Significant breakthroughs are happening in lupus more broadly, and I‘m excited for the year ahead.

In your view, what is the single most important takeaway for patients from the lupus research advances of 2025?

TS: An important advancement this year has been the growing emphasis on and integration of the patients’ lived experiences in lupus research. We are seeing more consequential incorporation of patient-reported outcomes (PROs) in clinical evaluation. Through the Lupus Accelerating Breakthroughs Consortium (Lupus ABC), the patient’s voice is being infused into the drug development process, and two Lupus ABC PRO projects are working toward developing recommendations for the meaningful integration of PRO measures in lupus clinical trials to support the approval of new treatments. A major advance in the effective use of PROs in lupus clinical trials was the reported correlation of PROs, including fatigue and health-related quality of life, to the clinical outcomes in the successful Phase 3 study of the anti-CD40L therapy dapirolizumab pegol. These findings and the overall PRO efforts in lupus give much hope for the meaningful integration of patients’ experiences in both clinical research and care.