Dissecting the host immune response to bacterial and HIV carbohydrate antigens to guide vaccine design

疫苗对于防止疾病的传播很重要。成功的疫苗通过产生一种名为抗体的蛋白质来识别和杀死病毒和细菌等致病因子，从而使人体的免疫系统准备好对抗潜在的致命疾病。许多感染性物质的表面都有碳水化合物结构。常规用于接种婴儿的细菌疫苗的工作原理是产生抗体，结合细菌表面的特定碳水化合物。此外，我之前的工作也表明，少数艾滋病毒感染者会产生抗体，与病毒表面的碳水化合物结合，从而杀死艾滋病毒。这些观察表明，旨在产生碳水化合物结合抗体的疫苗可能在控制疾病传播方面取得成功。该项目的目的是了解人体在感染艾滋病毒期间和接种细菌疫苗后如何产生这些碳水化合物特异性抗体，以便制造新的疫苗。这项工作将涉及从艾滋病毒感染患者和接种细菌疫苗的个人中分离碳水化合物特异性抗体。我将确定抗体是什么样子的，以及抗体与哪些碳水化合物结合。在未来，我们可以利用这些信息来设计新的碳水化合物疫苗，以防止疾病传播。因此，从长远来看，这项研究将广泛应用于许多表面显示碳水化合物的感染性病原体，并可能有助于预防艾滋病毒等传染病。

Vaccines are important for preventing the spread of disease. Successful vaccines prepare the body's immune system to fight potentially deadly diseases by producing proteins called antibodies that identify and kill disease-causing agents like viruses and bacteria. Many infectious agents have carbohydrate structures on their surfaces. The bacterial vaccines used routinely to vaccinate infants work by producing antibodies that bind the specific carbohydrates on the bacterial surface. In addition, my previous work has also shown that a small number of HIV-infected patients produce antibodies that bind the carbohydrates on the virus surface and kill HIV. These observations suggest that vaccines designed to produce carbohydrate-binding antibodies could be successful at controlling disease spread. The aim of this project is to understand how the body makes these carbohydrate-specific antibodies during HIV infection and following vaccination with bacterial vaccines so that new vaccines can be made. This work will involve the isolation of carbohydrate-specific antibodies from HIV-infected patients and from individuals vaccinated with bacterial vaccines. I will determine what the antibodies look like and which carbohydrates the antibodies bind to. In the future we can use the information to design new carbohydrate-based vaccines that may prevent disease spread. Thus, in the long-term this research will have wide application to many infectious agents displaying carbohydrates on their surfaces and may potentially help prevent infectious diseases such as HIV.