Vaccine designs to trigger broadly neutralizing HIV antibodies
Developing Immunogens to Elicit Broadly Neutralizing anti-HIV-1 Antibodies
This project makes and tests vaccine-style proteins to guide the immune system to produce powerful antibodies that can block many strains of HIV for people at risk or living with HIV.
Quick facts
| Grant type | P01 program project |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | California Institute of Technology NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Pasadena, United States) |
| Project ID | NIH-11252591 on NIH RePORTER |
What this research studies
From a patient's view, researchers are using a closely related monkey model to watch how rare, powerful HIV antibodies develop over time and then copy those steps to design better vaccine ingredients. They will create ‘‘priming’’ and ‘‘boosting’’ immunogens that focus the immune response on vulnerable parts of the virus (the V3 glycan and CD4 binding site) and edit sugars on the viral envelope to steer antibody growth. The team will iterate designs based on immune responses, aiming to push antibody lineages toward broadly neutralizing activity. Work is laboratory- and animal-based now but is intended to guide future human vaccine trials.
Who could benefit from this research
Good fit: Ideal human candidates for future studies would be people at risk for HIV or people living with HIV who might join clinical trials to test the new vaccine approaches.
Not a fit: Patients seeking immediate new treatments for their current infection are unlikely to benefit directly from this preclinical work, and those with unrelated health conditions would not be affected.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, this work could lead to vaccines or immune therapies that make antibodies able to prevent or control many different HIV strains.
How similar studies have performed: Researchers have isolated broadly neutralizing antibodies from some people and shown proof-of-concept antibody responses in animals, but reliably inducing such antibodies by vaccination in humans remains largely unproven.
Where this research is happening
Pasadena, United States
- California Institute of Technology — Pasadena, United States (Active)
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Bjorkman, Pamela J — California Institute of Technology
- Study coordinator: Bjorkman, Pamela J
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page below.