IRF5 and autoimmune disease: Studies have demonstrated that IRF1 is associated with Behcet’s disease [8] whereas IRF5 has been found to be associated with certain autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) [9,10], inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) [11], rheumatoid arthritis (RA) [12], and multiple sclerosis (MS) [13].