Prevention of AIDS

预防艾滋病

• 批准号: 7338497
• 负责人: BARBARA K FELBER
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: DIVISION OF BASIC SCIENCES - NCI
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 至
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/7338497
• 关键词: Prevention; AIDS

To study prevention of AIDS, we have a long-standing collaboration with George Pavlakis (Human Retrovirus Section, Vaccine Branch), and we have generated efficient DNA expression vectors, which are currently evaluated as vaccines against SIV and HIV. This work is based on the previous recognition that RNA elements (called INS) present within the gag/pol and env coding regions of HIV are responsible for nuclear retention and instability of the transcripts in the absence of Rev, and that these elements can be eliminated by changing the RNA composition without affecting the amino acid sequence. These RNA optimized gag and env expression vectors mediate the development of protective immune responses in vaccinated macaques when used as DNA only as well as DNA prime vaccine modality. We have now shown that that a combination of DNA vaccine vectors producing native and modified antigens are able to induce immune responses able to protect from high viremia in the rhesus macaque/SIVmac251 model. Current studies examine the role of these DNA vaccines as therapeutic modalities. In collaboration with other investigators we have studied immunogenicity of additional HIV and SIV genes either as DNAs or as part of viral vectors. We have shown that these DNAs provide an excellent prime in DNA prime-recombinant Herpes boost studies inducing protective immune responses. We have also shown that combinations of SIV DNA vaccine together with IL-12 or IL-15 as DNA adjuvants improve immunogenicity.Our goal is to dissect correlates of protective immunity, which will allow design of better vaccine strategies. Thus infected macaques, able to control viremia serve as model to study the underlying mechanisms. Among the 'controllers', animals infected with live-attenuated SIV strains provide an important model to study cellular and viral determinants that contribute to disease development and they also provide a unique tool to study mechanisms leading to protective immunity. We study the regulated expression of HIV, which is mediated via the viral Rev protein with the goal to evaluate the role of Rev in pathogenesis. Our discovery of other RNA export mechanisms (mediate via cellular RNA export factors and retrovial RNA export elements CTE, RTE as studied in project 1) provided the key tools to generate HIV and SIV variants that have the Rev/RRE regulatory system replaced. CTE or RTE provide us also with useful tools to achieve efficient expression of HIV and SIV structural protein in simple DNA vectors used as vaccine approaches against AIDS. Importantly, we found that our Rev-independent SIV strains are not pathogenic in rhesus macaques, which demonstrates that the Rev regulation plays an important role for SIV pathogenicity. In a recent long-term follow-up study we showed that such animals show persistent humoral and cellular SIV-specific immune responses, consistent with chronic infection but lack of pathogenicity. Multicolor flow cytometric analysis demonstrated preservation of the Central Memory subset of T-cells in the attenuated SIV-infected animals. This study demonstrates a potent, long-lasting control of the Rev-independent attenuated SIV in macaques. Replacement of the natural regulatory controls of Rev-RRE by the CTE provides a novel approach to lower the virulence of a pathogenic lentivirus. These studies provide critical information about the establishment and maintenance of host immune responses during chronic retroviral infections with distinct pathogenic outcomes. Macaques immunized with attenuated viruses develop persistent humoral and cellular immune responses, able to protect the animals from highly pathogenic SIV challenge. We are in the process to study the underlying mechanism. Therefore, these live-attenuated SIV strains provide us not only with a unique tool to dissect cellular and viral determinants that contribute to AIDS development, but are also useful for studying correlates of protective immunity.

为了研究艾滋病的预防，我们与乔治帕夫拉基斯（人类逆转录病毒科，疫苗分支）进行了长期合作，我们已经产生了有效的DNA表达载体，目前正在评估其作为SIV和HIV的疫苗。这项工作是基于以前的认识，即RNA元件（称为INS）内存在的gag/pol和env编码区的HIV是负责核保留和不稳定的转录本在Rev的情况下，这些元件可以消除通过改变RNA组成而不影响氨基酸序列。这些RNA优化的gag和env表达载体在仅用作DNA以及DNA引发疫苗形式时介导接种疫苗的猕猴中保护性免疫应答的发展。我们现在已经表明，产生天然抗原和修饰抗原的DNA疫苗载体的组合能够诱导免疫应答，能够在恒河猴/SIVmac 251模型中保护免于高病毒血症。目前的研究检查这些DNA疫苗作为治疗方式的作用。在与其他研究人员的合作中，我们研究了其他HIV和SIV基因作为DNA或作为病毒载体的一部分的免疫原性。我们已经表明，这些DNA提供了一个很好的引物在DNA引物重组疱疹加强研究诱导保护性免疫反应。我们还发现SIV DNA疫苗与IL-12或IL-15作为DNA佐剂的组合提高了免疫原性，我们的目标是剖析保护性免疫的相关性，这将有助于设计更好的疫苗策略。因此，能够控制病毒血症的感染猕猴可作为研究潜在机制的模型。在“制造者”中，感染减毒SIV活毒株的动物提供了一个重要的模型来研究有助于疾病发展的细胞和病毒决定因素，它们也提供了一个独特的工具来研究导致保护性免疫的机制。我们研究了HIV的调节表达，这是通过病毒Rev蛋白介导的，目的是评估Rev在发病机制中的作用。我们发现的其他RNA输出机制（通过细胞RNA输出因子和逆转录病毒RNA输出元件CTE，RTE介导，如项目1中所研究的）提供了产生HIV和SIV变体的关键工具，这些变体具有Rev/RRE调节系统。CTE或RTE也为我们提供了有用的工具，以实现HIV和SIV结构蛋白在简单DNA载体中的有效表达，用作抗AIDS的疫苗方法。重要的是，我们发现我们的Rev非依赖性SIV毒株在恒河猴中不具有致病性，这表明Rev调节在SIV致病性中起重要作用。在最近的一项长期随访研究中，我们发现这些动物表现出持续的体液和细胞SIV特异性免疫应答，与慢性感染一致，但缺乏致病性。多色流式细胞术分析表明在减毒SIV感染的动物中保留了T细胞的中央记忆亚群。本研究证明了在猕猴中对Rev非依赖性减毒SIV的有效、持久控制。用CTE替代Rev-RRE的天然调节控制提供了降低致病性慢病毒毒力的新方法。这些研究提供了关于在慢性逆转录病毒感染期间建立和维持宿主免疫应答的关键信息，这些免疫应答具有不同的致病结果。用减毒病毒免疫的猕猴产生持续的体液和细胞免疫应答，能够保护动物免受高致病性SIV攻击。我们正在研究潜在的机制。因此，这些减毒SIV活毒株不仅为我们提供了一种独特的工具来剖析有助于艾滋病发展的细胞和病毒决定因素，而且还可用于研究保护性免疫的相关性。