Vaccines & Immune Biology

Peter Nara of Biological Mimetics, Inc. in the U.S. will use a new vaccine technology to produce non-infectious poliovirus-like particles that can be used in one highly effective, low-cost polio vaccine capable of inducing protective immunity against all circulating serotypes.

David Relman of Stanford University in the U.S. will work with collaborators to study the compositions of intestinal microbial communities in children given the oral polio vaccine (OPV). By identifying the gut microbial characteristics of those who display a low response to OPV, Relman and his team can identify predictors of response to the oral vaccine and target children who may need additional dosing and follow-up.

Francis Delpeyroux of the Institut Pasteur in France will research whether adding immune pressure against proteins found in the attenuated strains of the oral polio vaccine could lead to the emergence of recombinant circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses. Identifying this mechanism could help in development of better vaccines to control polio outbreaks.

Satoshi Kashiwagi of Massachusetts General Hospital in the U.S. will test whether pre-treating the skin at the site of vaccination with an infrared laser light to stimulate antigen-presenting cells will result in a stronger immune response to the polio vaccination. The laser-based technology could reduce the number of vaccinations required to protect children from polio.

Anthony van den Pol of Yale University in the U.S. proposes to engineer a highly immunogenic virus to express replication-restricted poliovirus proteins for use in a new nasal spray polio vaccine. The spray will then be tested for its ability to generate a strong immune response against the virus and refined to increase its shelf life at room temperature.

Eric Nuermberger and Justin Hanes of Johns Hopkins University in the U.S. propose to encapsulate vaccine components into nanoparticles that can slip through the mucus barriers lining the respiratory and gastrointestinal tracts to deliver their payload to cells responsible for immune responses. This technology may result in more effective and better tolerated oral and inhaled tuberculosis vaccines.

Calman A. MacLennan of Novartis Vaccines Institute for Global Health in Italy will develop a technology platform for the production of highly immunogenic and affordable polysaccharide vaccines. The platform will produce bacterial polysaccharides linked to outermembrane GMMA particles, rather than to carrier proteins, that will act as adjuvants for an enhanced antibody response.

Robert Gerbasi of the Naval Medical Research Center in the U.S. seeks to identify malaria peptide antigens that present themselves on the surface of infected liver cells for use in the development of new malaria vaccines.

Bart Faber of the Biomedical Primate Research Centre in the Netherlands will attempt to create a malaria vaccine using artificial merozoites, which are the blood stage form of the disease. Faber will engineer yeast cells to present multiple surface proteins and measure subsequent antibody production. If successful, this yeast vaccine could be easy to produce and easily transported and stored at ambient temperatures.

Charles Long of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences in the U.S. will develop a strategy for generating single vaccines against diseases that infect both humans and animals (zoonotic) for use in both species that can be locally produced in goat milk. They will select two antigens from pathogens causing seven zoonotic diseases, including tuberculosis and trypanosomiasis, and incorporate them into vectors for producing the vaccines in lactating dairy goats.