Madhu Choudhary, MD, has been awarded funding in the amount of $657,036 for a one-year administrative supplement to the U01AI152969 award (Sharon Riddler, PI) by the National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIH/NIAID) for a proposal entitled “Assays to Assess the Impact of Native-like Envelope Trimer as a Therapeutic Vaccine.” This proposal was submitted in response to the funding opportunity entitled “Administrative Supplements to Existing NIH Grants and Cooperative Agreements” under funding opportunity announcement PA-20- 272.
Specific antibodies that block many strains of HIV are called broadly neutralizing antibodies or bnAbs. Rare people living with HIV (PLWH) develop these antibodies in their blood and others may have early or partially active antibodies. Drs. Choudhary and Riddler are conducting a clinical trial of a new vaccine, called Trimer 4571, to determine if the vaccine is safe in PLWH and if it induces and/or enhances the antibody response to HIV. The supplemental award will support the inclusion of new assays to further assess the immune responses to the vaccine. Specifically, electron microscopy-based epitope mapping will evaluate how and where antibodies bind to the vaccine immunogen in 3-D structure. A second new assay will measure vaccine induced changes in the neutralizing antibody responses against participants’ autologous virus in the clinical trial. Overall, these assays will provide additional insight and assessment of the impact of trimer 4571 as a therapeutic vaccine. If successful, this may pave the way toward achieving sustained remission of HIV in the absence of antiretroviral therapy.
Congratulations Madhu!