Jennifer Howitt Anolik, MD, PhD
Photo: Jennifer H Anolik

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Elected 2015
Dr. Jennifer H. Anolik is Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Allergy/Immunology and Rheumatology and Associate Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Rochester Medical Center. Her laboratory focuses on human B cell biology, the underlying pathogenic mechanisms of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and systemic lupus erythematosis (SLE), and the development of novel treatment paradigms. Dr. Anolik was part of the first group to investigate the use of rituximab in the treatment of SLE and the effects of B cell depletion on immune function, establishing B cell targeted therapies as a major advance in the field of immunologic disease. She has also pioneered the use of tonsil and bone marrow biopsies as a means of investigating immune dysregulation in human autoimmune disease and was the first investigator to characterize the immunologic reconstitution after B cell depletion in both lymphoma and autoimmunity. Her unique findings demonstrating a link between clinical response and immunologic reconstitution with transitional B cells was the first delineation of a B regulatory cell population in humans, greatly advancing our understanding of human B cell development pathways and antibody independent roles for B cells. Her recent work has elucidated a previously unrecognized cross-talk between the B cell compartment and neutrophil driven α interferon production in the bone marrow in SLE that alters B cell development and selection and a critical role for B cells in regulation of bone homeostasis in RA via effects on osteoclasts and osteoblasts.