'Designer' Inorganic Vaccine Adjuvants

有效的疫苗需要既含有抗原，例如病毒、微生物或肿瘤成分，更重要的是含有佐剂。疫苗佐剂的作用是复制或模仿自然触发免疫反应的“危险信号”，从而提高疫苗的效率。目前很少有疫苗佐剂获准供人类使用，它们是铝和镁盐的混合物，人们对它们知之甚少，而且似乎对这些材料的化学几乎完全缺乏最基本的了解。这项研究拨款申请建议研究精心制备的纯无机化合物，这些化合物的组成、大小和形状都有明确的定义，以便我们能够开始揭开影响疫苗佐剂效率的化学和结构因素。如果成功，该项目将提供令人兴奋的可能性，创造出新一代有效、安全和廉价的无机佐剂，供全球用于疫苗接种。

Effective vaccines need to contain both an antigen, e.g. a viral, microbial or tumour component, and crucially an adjuvant. The role of a vaccine adjuvant is to reproduce or mimic the ‘danger signals‘ that naturally trigger immune responses and so enhance the efficiently of the vaccine. Very few vaccine adjuvants are currently licensed for human use, they are poorly understood mixtures of aluminium and magnesium salts, and it appears that even the most basic understanding of the chemistry of these materials is almost totally lacking. This research grant application proposes to study carefully prepared pure inorganic compounds with well defined composition, size and shape so that we can begin to unravel the chemical and structure factors that affect the efficient of vaccine adjuvants. If successful, this project will offer the exciting possibility of creating the next generation of effective, safe and cheap inorganic adjuvants for global use in vaccination.