Jones Seminar: Broadly Neutralizing Antibodies in the Changing Landscape of Vaccine Design

Optional ZOOM LINK
Meeting ID: 935 8655 7757
Passcode: 008066

Recent studies identifying antibodies from infected patients that can neutralize diverse strains of HIV have changed the landscape of vaccine design. While these broadly neutralizing antibodies (bNAbs) are the ultimate goal of any future vaccine, a range of approaches is being explored to generate this class of antibody de novo in patients. This presentation will focus on the use of viral vectors as a means of producing these bNAbs in vivo. We demonstrate that these antibodies are capable of suppressing actively replicating HIV infections, but their effectiveness is directly related to the ease with which the virus escapes selection pressure. Modulating the resistance benefit and fitness cost of these mutations directly impacts their therapeutic efficacy, revealing important principles for the design of novel therapeutic regimens capable of continuously suppressing HIV.

Hosted by Professor Margie Ackerman

About the Speaker(s)

Alejandro Balazs
Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard

Alejandro B. Balazs is an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a principal investigator at the Ragon Institute of Mass General Brigham, MIT, and Harvard. Balazs received his PhD from Harvard and conducted postdoctoral research at the California Institute of Technology prior to joining the faculty at Harvard Medical School. His laboratory explores the fundamental mechanisms by which the immune system prevents the establishment of infection by employing immunological engineering as a tool to dissect the underpinnings of protection mediated by the natural immune system. His group is focused on applying this understanding to the development and implementation of novel technologies to engineer immunity as an alternative approach towards preventing or treating infection.

Contact

For more information, contact Amos Johnson at amos.l.johnson@dartmouth.edu.