The Food Allergy Science Initiative (FASI) at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard is the first coordinated effort to create a field of study around food allergy. Our team leverages talent and resources from MIT, Harvard, the Harvard Medical School-affiliated hospitals, Yale, the University of Massachusetts, and beyond. We have assembled a team of experts across a wide variety of disciplines—from gastroenterology to immunology, from the clinic to the bench, and from computational biology to engineering. Bringing together these specialists will result in innovative solutions that overcome the fundamental hurdles of food allergy research.
Food allergy continues to threaten millions of children and adults, but we don’t understand why it’s becoming more common—or how we can best treat it. Unless we understand the underlying biological basis of the disease now, there will be no therapeutic progress. Now is the time to apply these tools to change the future of food allergy.
Initial support to launch FASI came from Ellie and Brian Chu, Karen and Farhad Nanji, Christine Olsen and Robert Small, the Richard and Susan Smith Family Foundation, Betsy and Martin Solomon, and Lesley Solomon and Derek Hibbard.
In addition to the FASI Director, Ruslan Medzhitov of Yale, FASI’s scientific leaders include Vijay Kuchroo (Broad, HMS, BWH); J. Christopher Love (Broad, MIT, MGH); Hans Oettgen (Boston Children's Hospital, HMS); Aviv Regev (Broad, MIT); Wayne Shreffler (MGH, HMS); and Ramnik Xavier (Broad, MGH, MIT, HMS).
Overview of Symposium:
What Feeds Allergies?
Speakers from the bench, clinic, and industry will share the latest research highlights in understanding potentially allergic components of food, how the body senses food, and the immunology underlying food allergy.
Click here to learn more about FASI.