Adjuvant Development Discovery Team

The Adjuvant Development Discovery Team is led by Dr. Norm Letvin of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.  Investigators in adjuvant development will work to develop novel adjuvants that optimize the immunogenicity of candidate HIV-1 vaccines produced by the CHAVI.

B Cell Immunology Discovery Team

The B Cell Immunology Discovery Team is led by Dr. Barton Haynes of Duke University.  Investigators in B cell immunology will work to define the ontogeny of epitope-specific anti-HIV-1 binding and neutralizing antibodies as well as antigen specific B cells during acute HIV infection (AHI) in order to determine why broadly neutralizing antibodies are rarely made in AHI.  With the antibodyome CHAVI - Gates collaboration, this team has used new technology to clone out specific monoclonal antibodies.

Host Genetics Discovery Team

The Host Genetics Discovery Team is led by Dr. David Goldstein of Duke University.  This team uses both CHAVI and other cohort collaborations in various genome wide association and /or full genome sequencing studies in order to determine genes that contribute to control or prevention of HIV-1. This team works collaboratively with the other discovery teams to take these findings and perform functional follow up studies.

Innate Immunity Discovery Team

The Innate Immunity Discovery Team is led by Dr. Andrew McMichael of Oxford University and Dr. Persephone Borrow of the Edward Jenner Institute.  Investigators in innate immunity will study the functional properties of peripheral blood natural killer (NK) and dendritic cells (DC) in order to find a way to decrease the setpoint viral load and increase or maintain the levels of central memory CD4+ T cells.  By focusing on the NK and DC cells during the acute stages of HIV infection, investigators can ascertain their T cell stimulatory capacity and their ability to suppress HIV replication.  This research aims to develop vaccines that can recruit an accelerated innate immune response to HIV-1.

Mucosal Immunity Discovery Team

The Mucosal Immunity Discovery Team is led by Dr. Robin Shattock of St. George’s Hospital in London.  Investigators in mucosal immunity will work to define the immune responses and host defenses at mucosal surfaces during HIV-1 transmission in order to develop vaccines that prevent mucosal transmission of HIV.

Non-Human Primate Discovery Team

The Non-Human Primate Discovery Team is led by Dr. Norm Letvin of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.  This team is working to define the correlates of immune protection.

Structural Biology Discovery Team

The Structural Biology Discovery Team is led by Dr. Joseph Sodroski of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and with Dr. Steven Harrison of the Children’s Hospital Boston.  Investigators in structural biology will focus on the structural properties of the HIV-1 trimer in order to develop a comprehensive picture of the conformational changes the virus undergoes during Acute HIV infection (AHI).  This team works in conjunction with the B cell and Viral Biology discovery teams.  This research will assist investigators in the design of stable envelope forms of HIV-1 that can potentially induce broadly reactive neutralizing antibodies.

T Cell Immunology Discovery Team

The T Cell Immunology Discovery Team is led by Dr. Andrew McMichael of Oxford University.  Investigators in T cell immunology are performing a comprehensive analysis of the ontogeny of CD4 and CD8 T cell responses specific to HIV-1 in acutely infected HIV-1 patients.  The role of T regulatory cells is also being explored.  In addition, this team is  performing clarifying studies to determine whether or not exposed and uninfected (EU) patients have anti-HIV-1 immune responses that are correlates of protection.

Vaccine Design Discovery Team

The Vaccine Design Discovery Team is led by Dr. Barton Haynes of Duke University.  Investigators in vaccine design will work in the Vector Development Core to design vectors, inserts and composite immunogens for testing in the Non-Human Primate Core.  This team is ultimately responsible for ascertaining whether something should be considered for vaccine development.

Viral Biology Discovery Team

The Viral Biology Team is led by Beatrice Hahn while the Computational Biology Team is led by Bette Korber. Together they lead the work in this discovery team to generate panels of transmitted viruses in acute infection and to create and maintain a transmitted HIV-1 sequence database for vaccine design and viral biology studies. This team works very closely with the T cell Immunology Discovery Team and provides resources to all of the teams.