Immunological diseases encompass a wide variety of disorders, affecting a steadily increasing proportion of people living in modern societies. Immunological diseases include multiple sclerosis, systemic lupus, rheumatoid arthritis and cancer. During the past decade, dramatic advances have been made in understanding mechanisms regulating the immune system, its pathological processes, and processes of immune deviation. As such, it was recognized that systemic or organ-specific inflammatory, infectious and autoimmune conditions share basic mechanisms of initiation and progression. Further elucidation of these mechanisms promises to be of very high value for diagnosis and treatment of these disorders.
In this context, the MUGEN network of Excellence aims to structure and shape a world-class framework of European scientific and technological excellence in the field of “murine models for immunological disease”, to advance understanding of the genetic basis of disease and to enhance innovation and translatability of research efforts. MUGEN’s specific mission is to bring together different expertise from academic and industrial laboratories in order to study human immunological disease by integrating the participant institutions’ strengths in immunological knowledge with new approaches in functional genomics. By removing barriers to progress and promoting the synergistic interaction of scientists from various disciplines integrated, MUGEN expects to bring Europe a competitive advantage in the development of new diagnostic and therapeutic tools.