Speakers

The prospect of an effective CMV vaccine means significant benefits for immunocompromised patients such as those with AIDS, or stem cell and solid organ transplant recipients. A therapeutic CMV peptide vaccine developed at City of Hope is undergoing phase II human efficacy testing in City of Hope stem cell transplant recipients, while a second-generation CMV vaccine based on the attenuated poxvirus MVA, or modified vaccinia Ankara, is currently undergoing phase I human safety testing.

A vaccine based on the MVA platform expressing unmutated p53 has completed phase I human testing in City of Hope gastrointestinal cancer patients. In the laboratory, we are refining a therapeutic platform based on attenuated Salmonella bacterium to treat a range of malignancies including pancreatic, skin and brain cancers. In collaboration with Peter Barry, Ph.D., of University of California at Davis and the National Primate Research Center, we are developing a prophylactic CMV vaccine that promises to control gestational infection that causes a wide range of birth defects that annually afflict close to 4,000 American children.