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$24.7 Million Gates Foundation Grant for AIDS Vaccine Development ADARC is joining forces with leading scientists at Rockefeller University, Mount Sinai Medical Center, and Taiwan’s Academia Sinica to launch a new vaccine initiative that aims to boost immune responses to HIV using strategies that target dendritic cells, a critical component of the body’s immune system. The five-year program, funded by a $24.7 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, will support the work of Dr. David D. Ho, ADARC’s director and Irene Diamond Professor at Rockefeller University, and the other consortium partners. ADARC will act as lead agency for the initiative and Dr. Ho will be its principal investigator. The Gates Foundation grant is one of 16 totaling $287 million to create an international network of highly collaborative research consortia focused on accelerating the pace of HIV vaccine development. The grants will support a range of innovative approaches for designing an effective HIV vaccine, bringing together more than 165 investigators from 19 countries to tackle some of the biggest scientific challenges facing the field. The immune system’s dendritic cells could play a key role in boosting the body’s own defenses to levels sufficient to ward off HIV infection. The consortium led by Dr. Ho will design vaccines with molecules that harness dendritic cells’ ability to stimulate the body’s immune response, enhancing both cellular immunity and neutralizing antibodies. The investigators will also study the use of chemicals called glycolipids, which can stimulate dendritic cells to generate a better immune response. Although glycolipids are being tested to treat cancer, their effectiveness in improving immune responses elicited by vaccines has never been studied in humans. “Much of our growing knowledge of immunology has yet to be tapped to develop HIV vaccines,” says Dr. Ho. “With groundbreaking support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, we will gain critical knowledge at this frontier of immunological research.” Dr. Gerald Friedland, Chairman of ADARC stated, “We are delighted to play a leadership role in this groundbreaking new initiative. The Gates Foundation, by their generosity and foresight, is giving us a twofold opportunity – to push the boundaries of scientific understanding about dendritic cells’ potential role in the fight against HIV, and to work with top scientists from around the world to pool expertise, techniques and resources.”
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