Yoshihiro Kawaoka
University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI·Microbiology & Immunology
Flu shots have to be remade almost every year because influenza viruses constantly change the surface proteins our antibodies recognize. Efforts to escape that treadmill by building a broadly protective, potentially universal vaccine have focused almost entirely on influenza A viruses.
- Fields
Microbiology & Immunology
Medicine & Clinical Research
Biochemistry
- Topics
influenza B virus
influenza A virus
hemagglutinin
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jun 2027
What they work on
- Engineer influenza B hemagglutinin mutants whose antigenic properties lie between the virus's two major lineages, using mutagenesis, to create antigens that may elicit antibodies protecting against both lineages.
- Build the first antigenic map for influenza B hemagglutinin, charting how similarly antibodies recognize different strains, as a tool to evaluate candidate vaccine antigens.
- Assess the immunogenicity of the top five candidate antigens in ferrets, comparing adjuvanted secreted hemagglutinin with hemagglutinin displayed on nanoparticles built from a self-assembling bacteriophage protein.
- Identify which conserved hemagglutinin sites the vaccine-elicited antibodies target, using a phage display approach that maps antibody binding to protein fragments.
- Test protective efficacy of the two best immunogens by challenging immunized ferrets with influenza B viruses from both current lineages and an ancestral pre-split virus, comparing virus titers and immune responses with controls.
More about the research
Influenza B viruses, which cause yearly epidemics with substantial illness and death, have been comparatively neglected even though current vaccines against them are also suboptimal. This project proposes a strategy for an influenza B vaccine that protects across the virus's diversity rather than matching one circulating strain.
Why it matters
Influenza B viruses sicken people every year, and the vaccines against them must be reformulated repeatedly as new antigenic variants appear. A hemagglutinin designed to sit antigenically between the two circulating lineages could, if it protects broadly in ferrets, become a vaccine component covering both lineages at once and complement universal influenza A vaccine candidates, reducing the need for annual reformulation.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
David Veesler
University of Washington, WA·Microbiology & Immunology
Characterize how broadly serum antibodies from nonhuman primates immunized with nanoparticle vaccines co-displaying multiple receptor-binding-domain and spike antigens bind and neutralize betacoronaviruses.
Joseph Zaia
Boston University, MA·Chemistry
Identify glycosaminoglycans (GAGs), long sulfated sugar chains, attached to specific brain matrisome proteins, using an Omnitrap mass spectrometry platform to analyze peptides carrying several sugar chains.
Ashley Nelson
Weill Medical College of Cornell University, NY·Microbiology & Immunology
Compare giving germline-targeting HIV envelope immunogens one after another versus all at once for waking up precursor B cells of two broadly neutralizing antibody classes: those binding the CD4 binding site and those binding the V2 apex of the viral spike.
The school
University of Wisconsin-Madison: 91 labs on PI Pages, $1.9B a year on research, 854 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
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