Cerus Corporation Awarded Grants for Its Listeria-Based Vaccine Platforms
The first grant, awarded to researches at Cerus and two collaborators from Johns Hopkins University (JHU) is entitled, "Development of Listeria-based Clinical Consensus HCV Vaccine Candidates." This grant was received from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, a division of the National Institutes of Health.
The collaboration brings together HCV consensus sequence antigens defined at JHU and Cerus' proprietary vaccine platforms that naturally target innate and adaptive immune response to the liver, which is the natural reservoir for chronic HCV infection. These vaccines could be used alternatively to treat individuals with chronic HCV infection or to prevent infection with the virus.
The second grant was awarded to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, which is participating in the Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery (CAVD) initiative funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Cerus will provide HIV vaccine prototypes to Fred Hutchinson's CAVD consortium for evaluation in non-human primate models of HIV infection.
Both the proprietary live-attenuated and KBMA Listeria vaccine platforms developed at Cerus will be evaluated in the HCV and HIV programs. The live-attenuated vaccine platform strain, also known as CRS-100, is currently being tested in an ongoing Phase I clinical trial in study subjects who have advanced carcinoma and hepatic metastases, and are refractory to standard therapy (clinicaltrials.gov identifier NCT00327652).
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