Grant: Project Grant

Intestinal fibrosis is a common debilitating complication associated with the inflammatorybowel disease (IBD), Crohn's disease (CD). There are no clinical solutions for preventing or treating fibrosis, except for surgical intervention. Therefore, there is a great unmet need to understand the mechanisms leading to fibrotic complications in CD. In general, fibrosis is a consequence of dysregulated healing processes. We have developed a mouse model of chronic intestinal inflammation where mice possess one of the gene variants associated with human CD develop fibrosis. Using this model, we can now determine how the process by which cells in the intestine promote fibrosis, which may reveal targetable pathways for the treatment or prevention of this severe complication of CD.