Vaccine
Vaccine |
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| Vaccines have been proven to be crucial in combating many infectious diseases. The emergence of new diseases and re-emergence of “old” diseases have made the development of new and improved vaccines an urgent agenda. The vaccine research cluster in USM has been working on tuberculosis (TB) vaccine development for the last 10 years with strong collaborations with Cuba and Mexico. We started with the use of recombinant BCG as an improved vaccine against TB. Our approach has been to identify selected antigens that present both T and B cell epitopes to the immune system using bioinformatics approach. Our preliminary findings suggest that rBCG expressing selected T and B cell epitopes have much enhanced protective efficacy compared to the parent BCG strain. In addition to rBCG, we are also working on proteoliposomes and liposomes of M. smegmatis and BCG as potential boosters to BCG. Again our preliminary results have been encouraging. We are embarking on therapeutic vaccines against TB which is hoped to expedite the delivery of TB control to communities who need them. In this regard, we have established initial contact with the South African Tuberculosis Vaccine Initiative (SATVI) which is keen to explore further collaboration with our group. The active participation of our group with international research groups can be reflected in USM’s and Finlay’s initiative for the publication of the “The Art and Science of TB Vaccine Development” Book comprising contributions from world experts in the field (www.tbvaccine.usm). In addition to TB vaccine research, we are also working on the halal vaccine agenda to address the need of Muslims as well as populations in most underdeveloped nations. We are currently developing the halal versions of non-conjugated tetravalent meningococcal vaccine for Haj and Umrah pilgrims and typhoid vaccines for endemic and primarily developing nations. This developmental project is in collaboration with Finlay Institute, Cuba and is expected to enter pre-clinical trials soon. The halal vaccine agenda has also been implemented for our TB vaccine research. | |
| Contact Person: Professor Norazmi Mohd Nor School of Health Sciences |
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norazmi @ kb.usm.my |