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Novel vaccine vectors to resist pathogen challenge

Project description

A vaccine against chlamydia

Chlamydia trachomatis is the cause of the common sexually transmitted disease chlamydia. Although often asymptomatic, chlamydia may lead to pelvic inflammations, ectopic pregnancy or infertility. While Chlamydia trachomatis is responsive to antibiotics, reinfection is possible, necessitating the development of a vaccine. The EU-funded VacPath project is guiding early-stage researchers towards the development of a vaccine against chlamydia. Various vaccine approaches will be tested and optimised for their potential to generate not only humoral but also cell-mediated immunity against the bacterium. The main challenge is to generate an efficient vaccination strategy capable of controlling infections with different types of intracellular pathogens.

Objective

Infectious diseases are a major burden and constant threat to European populations and economies. While barely perceived as a danger not too long ago, a combination of potential rapid spread of novel pathogens across the globe, antibiotics resistance, a come-back of “old” pathogens and persistence of yet to be combated pathogens has raised the demand for effective but safe vaccines.
An example of a yet to be combated pathogen is the obligate intracellular bacterium Chlamydia trachomatis. This pathogen is the major cause of sexually transmitted bacterial disease in humans, and poses a world-wide health concern. While responsive to antibiotics, re-infections frequently occur, urging the need for a prophylactic vaccine. Nevertheless, insufficient knowledge on how to vaccinate against intracellular pathogens hampers the development of such vaccines.
In the proposed project, 5 academic and 2 private partners will cooperate to educate early stage researchers (ESR) in the diverse aspects of novel vaccine development. ESR will design and construct innovative and safe virus-, bacterium-, and plasmid-based vaccine vectors that induce both cell-mediated and humoral immunity, to control infections with intracellular pathogens. They will test these vaccines and improve their efficacy in preclinical models of C. trachomatis infection, and unravel the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying the induction of protective immune responses, to uncover possibilities for general vaccine vector optimisation.
The end-result will be a new generation of safe vaccine vectors that can be exploited to vaccinate against C. trachomatis, and can be adapted to vaccinate against further intracellular pathogens of choice. Moreover, this project will educate a new generation of scientists that, through the offered, integrated training, will be ready to enter the European task force, in academia or industry, to find creative solutions to future pathogen-imposed challenges.

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Keywords

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Programme(s)

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Topic(s)

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Funding Scheme

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MSCA-ITN - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Innovative Training Networks (ITN)

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Call for proposal

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(opens in new window) H2020-MSCA-ITN-2018

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Coordinator

UNIVERSITEIT UTRECHT
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 531 239,76
Address
HEIDELBERGLAAN 8
3584 CS Utrecht
Netherlands

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Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 531 239,76

Participants (6)

Partners (1)

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