UC Irvine scientists to develop vaccine to combat bioterrorism threat from deadl...( p>We can learn from what is happening ...)

p>"We can learn from what is happening in Thailand, where melioidosis is causing many people to die from septic shock," said Felgner. "An outbreak of the disease in the United States would be devastating, made worse by how difficult it is to treat patients suffering from this disease."

B. pseudomallei, an intracellular bacterium, grows and replicates within mammalian cells. After it has entered a cell, it is hard for antibodies to kill the bacterium without also permanently damaging the cell.

The research at UCI will be conducted in Felgner's proteomics laboratory, which belongs to a group of on-campus biodefense laboratories developing vaccines and other countermeasures that target infectious microorganisms. Felgner's research group will generate the B. pseudomallei proteome, i.e., all the proteins encoded by the genes in B. pseudomallei, to identify antigens useful for developing a vaccine against the bacterium.

UCI's Center for Virus Research is in the School of Biological Sciences. Felgner will be joined in the research at UCI by Luis Villarreal, director of the center, and D. Huw Davies, an immunologist and an associate project scientist in the Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry. The three scientists will also collaborate with the laboratories of Dr. Richard Titball at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratories at Porton Down, United Kingdom; Dr. Gregory Bancroft at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; and Dr. Ganjana Lertmemongkolchai at Khon Kaen University, Thailand.

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Contact: Iqbal Pittalwala
iqbal@uci.edu
949-824-3969
University of California - Irvine
25-Aug-2004

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