Aimee S. Payne BS, MD, PhD

Dr. Payne is an Associate Professor of Dermatology at the University of Pennsylvania. Her career interest has been in pemphigus: diagnosing and treating patients with this potentially fatal autoimmune disease, and performing research to better understand disease, with the goal of improving therapy. Dr. Payne received her BS in Biology from Stanford University and her MD/PhD from Washington University School of Medicine, followed by residency and postdoctoral fellowship training in Dermatology at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research has focused on three major areas of investigation: 1) cloning and characterization of B cell repertoires to understand how autoimmunity occurs in pemphigus, which has discovered common features of the B cell response among patients.

Dr. Payne is active in the International Pemphigus and Pemphigoid Foundation patient group and is a member of an international committee of physicians that has developed consensus definitions and disease activity instruments for use in clinical trials. At Penn, Dr. Payne serves as Associate Director of the Medical Scientist Training Program and faculty advisor for the Association of Women Student MD-PhDs (AWSM), through which she enjoys interacting with the larger physician-scientist community.