Chang Lab

Summary:

Malaria is a major cause of global morbidity and mortality in tropical countries and most notably among infants, young children and pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa. Our long term goal is to develop a safe and effective blood stage vaccine directed against merozoite surface protein-1 (MSP1), a major coat protein of P. falciparum merozoites. This goal requires development of two essential components of a malaria vaccine, (i) the production of an optimally immunogenic antigen capable of inducing a protective immune response, and (ii) the identification of an immunostimulatory and non-toxic adjuvant formulation that may be combined with this antigen to generate protective immunity to falciparum malaria. Previous studies in this laboratory have focused on developing a baculovirus recombinant 42 kDa MSP1 C-terminal polypeptide which is highly immunogenic and induces protection in a non-human primate model of P. falciparum malaria. One of our current research objectives is to improve the protective immune response to a P. falciparum MSP1-based malaria vaccine by combining sequences located within MSP1 blocks 4, 16, and 17 to induce protective immune responses to multiple MSP1 epitopes. Our second research objective is to evaluate the ability of a series of well-defined immunomodulators to stimulate an immune response to MSP1 with in vitro and in vivo biological activities against P. falciparum blood stages. We hypothesize that a multi-epitope MSP1 antigen formulated with specific combinations of TLR (Toll-like receptor) and NOD (nucleotide-binding oligomerization domain-like receptor) agonists will be effective in inducing a protective immune response to P. falciparum infection.

People:

• PI: Chang, Sandra, Ph.D.
  

Resources:

Instruments

• ELISA reader ( ELISA microplate reader )
  

• PCR machine ( PCR instrument )
  

• PCR machine ( PCR instrument )
  

Organisms and Viruses

• Bovine ( Mammalia )
  

• FCH-14 ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Philippines.

• FCH-17 ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Philippines.

• FCH-27 ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Philippines.

• FCH-7 ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Philippines.

• FUP ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Uganda/Palo Alto.

• FVO ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Vietnam/Oak Knoll.

• Honduras ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Honduras.

• Trichoplusia ni ( Lepidoptera )
  

• Vanuatu ( Plasmodium falciparum )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from Vanuatu/TAMC.

Reagents

• 219.5 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• 24A1.7 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• 3D7 ( Cell line )
  

  P. falciparum isolates from cloned isolate from NF54, Amsterdam airport

• AD9 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• BC9 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• BHK-21 ( Cell line )
  

  Hamster kidney fibroblast

• bMVEC-2 ( Cell line )
  

  Bovine brain microvascular endothelial cells.

• C6/36 ( Cell line )
  

• CACO-2 ( Tumor-derived cell line )
  

  Human epithelial colorectal adenocarcinoma cells.

• CE2 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• CTLL-2 ( Cell line )
  

  Murine cytotoxic T cell line (C57BL/6 strain).

• DB8.2 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• DMVE-2 ( Cell line )
  

  Human dermal microvascular endothelial cells.

• DMVEC-4 ( Cell line )
  

  Human dermal microvascular endothelial cells.

• DMVEC-5 ( Cell line )
  

  Human dermal microvascular endothelial cells.

• EB2 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• G13 ( Hybridoma cell line )
  

  Cell Type: Monoclonal, P. falciparum MSP-1.

• HEp 2 ( Tumor-derived cell line )
  

  Human laryngeal carcinoma.

• HUVEC-1 ( Cell line )
  

• HUVEC-2 ( Cell line )
  

• HUVEC-3 ( Cell line )
  

• LLC-MK2 ( Cell line )
  

  Rhesus monkey kidney epithelium

• Sf21 ( Cell line )
  

• Sf9 ( Cell line )
  

  Insect cell line

• Sf900 ( Cell line )
  

• Sf900II ( Cell line )
  

• Tni ( Cell line )
  

  Insect cell line

• U937 ( Tumor-derived cell line )
  

  Human monocyte from histiocytic lymphoma.

• VERO ( Cell line )
  

  Cercopithecus aethiops (African green monkey) kidney epithelium