NIH Scientists Advance Universal Flu Vaccine

[demoleft]

A universal influenza vaccine—so-called because it could potentially provide protection from all flu strains for decades—may become a reality because of research led by scientists from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health.

In experiments with mice, ferrets and monkeys, the investigators used a two-step immunization approach to elicit infection-fighting antibodies that attacked a diverse array of influenza virus strains. Current flu vaccines do not generate such broadly neutralizing antibodies, so they must be re-formulated annually to match the predominant virus strains circulating each year.

...

In parallel experiments with mice, ferrets and monkeys, Dr. Nabel and his colleagues first primed the animals’ immune systems with a vaccine made from DNA encoding the influenza virus hemagglutinin (HA) surface protein. After being primed with DNA vaccine, the mice and ferrets received a booster dose of the 2006-2007 seasonal influenza vaccine or a vaccine made from a weakened cold virus (an adenovirus) containing HA flu protein. Monkeys were boosted with the seasonal flu vaccine only.


This prime-boost vaccine stimulated an immune response to the stem of the lollipop-shaped hemagglutinin of influenza virus. Unlike HA’s head—which mutates readily, allowing the virus to become unrecognizable to antibodies—the stem varies relatively little from strain to strain. In principle, Dr. Nabel explains, antibodies generated against the stem of HA should be able to recognize and neutralize multiple flu strains.

Although the DNA in the priming vaccine was derived from a 1999 circulating flu virus, all the animals made antibodies capable of neutralizing virus strains from several other years. Mice and ferrets produced antibodies not only against virus strains dating from before 1999, including a strain that emerged in 1934, but also against strains that emerged in 2006 and 2007.

source: niaid, http://www.niaid.nih.gov/news/newsreleases/2010/Pages/universalfluvax.aspx

[Nuclear Unicorn]

1. Awesome news

Because it would suck if the universe got the flu.

[stray cat]

2. >35000 killed by influenza each year in the US alone