Virginia Commonwealth University researchers have received a National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases grant for $7.3 million for a research center to study asthma and allergic disease.

Allergic disease is the sixth-leading cause of chronic disease in the United States, and while various treatments have been developed to control allergy, no cure has been found.

The five-year cooperative research center project brings together four departments at VCU to study different aspects of asthma and allergic diseases.

There are four components to the study. In one project, the team hopes to better understand how people with allergies can be desensitized; and a second project aims to dissect the molecular pathways involved in allergic inflammation.

A third project will examine how the production of the allergy-causing antibody, IgE, is regulated, which may possibly lead to treatments that reduce its production. A fourth project examines a newly described lipid mediator of allergic inflammation. Agents that block this mediator have potential benefit to people with allergic conditions.