Infectious Disease

Golam Rabbani of International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR,B) will study the effects that a new model of indoor cooking stove with concealed combustion chambers and ventilation chimney has in reducing indoor air pollution and subsequently, reducing acute lower respiratory infections and TB in children.

Because malnutrition, micronutrient deficiency and parasitic worm infection are all major risk factors for developing visceral leishmaniasis, Dinesh Mondal of International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR,B) will study if VL development can be prevented in asymptomatic patients through nutritional supplements of vitamin A, zinc and iron, as well as anti-helminth treatment.

Fasséli Coulibaly of Monash University in Australia will design a vaccine platform based on protein crystals (MicroCubes) produced by insect viruses to produce new and more potent vaccines with increased stability, obviating the need for refrigerated storage. The crystal structure will be engineered to present multiple antigens that will then be tested for their ability to induce an effective immune response.

Mosquito transmitted pathogens such as dengue and malaria are a significant disease burden on the world's population. Paul Young of the University of Queensland in Australia aims to develop a novel vaccine approach that is based on blocking mosquito transmission of these disease agents rather than inducing pathogen- specific immunity.

The intestinal disease cholera uses cell-to-cell signaling to coordinate its growth and virulence in the human gut. John March of Cornell University in the U.S. is developing strains of commensal bacteria that naturally reside in the gut to express the key chemical signals used by cholera to abort the colonization process and allow the pathogen to pass through the G.I. system without causing symptoms.

John Abrams of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in the U.S. will utilize novel mutagenesis and selection strategies to develop new variants of the Cry protein, a toxin producing the pathogen Bt, in an effort to create customized insecticides that can selectively target disease vectors without harming humans and non-target species.

When blood-consuming sand flies transmit leishmaniasis they also inject substances from their saliva into humans that are necessary for small numbers of parasites to establish infection. William Wheat from Colorado State University in the U.S. will test whether a vaccine that neutralizes an important sand fly saliva component (maxadilan) will prevent parasitic infection.

Proteins known as TRP channels are responsible for coordinating sensations of taste, temperature, light and pheromones. Craig Montell of Johns Hopkins University in the U.S. will use high throughput screening to identify compounds that can activate these TRP channels in insect vectors of disease for use in a new generation of insect repellents.

Ofer Levy at Children's Hospital Boston in the U.S. will determine whether synthetic molecules called imidazoquinolines activate newborns' white blood cells, and could be used as candidate vaccine adjuvants to dramatically enhance immunization at birth. In this project's Phase I research, Levy demonstrated that Toll-like Receptor-7 and -8 agonists are superior to agonists of other Toll-like receptors and to alum, an already approved vaccine adjuvant, in activating newborn immune responses in studies in vitro.

Highly infectious "superspreaders" often drive the spread of infectious agents but are difficult to identify and treat. Leor S. Weinberger of UCSD and James Lloyd- Smith of UCLA will develop and test engineered pseudoviruses called Therapeutic Infectious Particles (TIPs), which conditionally replicate along with the pathogen as it spreads through populations, but have their virulence elements replaced with therapeutic elements that slow down disease progression and curtail transmission.