Vaccines
Introduction and Goals
An effective HIV vaccine that can control global spread of AIDS must:
- Be simple to administer
- Be inexpensive
- Induce long lasting immunity
- Be effective against all HIV subtypes
The disappointing results obtained with the Merck’s candidate HIV vaccine spurred NIAID to seek input on how best to reenergize the field of HIV vaccine discovery research. The scientific community emphasized the need to broaden research directed at answering fundamental questions in HIV vaccine discovery through laboratory, non-human primates, and clinical research.
Highest Research Priorities Identified at the NIAID HIV Vaccine Summit, March 2008 as published in Science 321: 530, 2008.
- Define the first events leading to entry of HIV and SIV into the gut-associated lymphoid tissue, including the availability of target cells in tissues and the cause and role of immune activation
- Determine the rate and mechanisms of recruiting innate and adaptive immune cells to the site of infection, and whether innate responses can alter the course of infection
- Characterize the cellular and humoral immune responses needed to control HIV and SIV viral replication through modulation and/or elimination of specific cell subsets in the SIV model and studies of HIV-infected populations
- Determine the three-dimensional structure of HIV envelope trimer
- Determine why broadly neutralizing antibodies are so uncommon and how they can be elicited
- Define the specificities of antibodies that neutralize diverse primary isolates
- Develop more relevant animal models and challenge viruses to explore protection or enhancement of infection or disease, particularly heterologous challenge models
- Determine why SIV is apathogenic in some non-human primate species
- Identify correlates of vaccine-induced immune protection, especially the mechanisms whereby non-pathogenic (e.g., attenuated) SIVs prevent infection by pathogenic virus
The HIV Vaccine Summit resulted in several new funding opportunities such as Highly Innovative Tactics to Interrupt Transmission of HIV (HIT-IT), Basic HIV Vaccine Discovery Research; and a workshop that brought together non-human primate researchers to provide guidance to DAIDS on how best to invest resources in nonhuman primate models to advance the development of an effective AIDS vaccine.
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