Seminar Title: Novel approaches to vaccine design for HIV-1, RSV, and EBV

Abstract: The overall goal of the McGuire Lab is to obtain a high-level understanding of protective antibody responses to viral antigens and to use this information to design and test safe and effective vaccines. We routinely apply this “reverse vaccinology” approach to viral pathogens of public health importance.

I will describe how structural and genetic analyses of protective broadly neutralizing antibodies (bNAbs) in complex with the HIV-1 Envelope protein have helped to define barriers to the elicitation of bNAbs through vaccination and led to the development of novel “germline-targeting immunogens."

I will also describe how we have applied the reverse vaccinology paradigm to Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) vaccine development. Our lab was the first to isolate and characterize human monoclonal antibodies that neutralize EBV infection. When passively delivered to humanized mice and non-human primates, these antibodies protect against EBV infection, establishing experimental proof of concept for antibody-mediated protection against EBV. Based on these encouraging results we have been evaluating subunit vaccines in murine and non-human primate challenge models.