A new vaccine that triggers the production of antibodies to block HIV going into healthy human cells is under development.
EuroNeut-41 is based on the gp41 protein, one of the envelope proteins of the HIV virus that is responsible fusing the HIV virus into human cells.
Nicolas Mouz, chief scientific officer at PX’Therapeutics, one of the partners in the EU-funded project, said that by integrating the gp41 protein into the vaccine, they can attempt to trigger the production of antibodies that would block HIV.
“We have used an innovative approach, combining protein engineering, specific vaccine formulation and a combination of routes of administration, [nasal] and intramuscular,” he said.
Alexandru Rafila, chairman of the Romanian Society for Microbiology in Bucharest, added that the development was “meaningful” in protein design because giving it as a vaccine would trigger an immune response.
“An efficient vaccine should hamper the infection of any other cells,” he told youris.com.
The diversity of HIV and its capacity to mutate are some of the main challenges for vaccine development.
But, says Ulrich Fruth, vaccine development and evaluation team leader at the World Health Organisation, in Geneva, Switzerland: “The idea basically is that a vaccine should induce antibodies T cells immune response. That would neutralise HIV in all of its forms.”
He admits that the success of a vaccine is difficult to predict.
“The only thing we know is that we have more experience on human trials,” he said. “The animal models used so far were not very predictive. We need human clinical trials in order to decide which vaccine to take forward.”
The vaccine is in its first stage of clinical safety studies, which proved to have a relatively weak effect, although, Fruth says, it is too early to offer an explanation for the results.
“We think that for a successful protection we may need [to target] both: antibodies and T cells. The role that I would see for such a vaccine would probably be in combination with the components that induce T cell immune response. So, [what may proved useful is to test] a combination vaccine [and] not a standalone one,” he added.
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