Development of a Practical Heroin-HIV Vaccine

Henry M. Jackson Fdn For The Adv Mil/Med, Rockville MD

Investigators

Linked publications & trials

Abstract

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): In recognition of the frequent association of HIV-1 infection with the use of injected heroin, the US Military HIV Research Program (MHRP) and the National Institute for Drug Abuse initiated a collaborative interagency agreement in 2010 to examine the feasibility of creating a practical combination anti-heroin vaccine (AHV) and HIV vaccine product. Based on the recent multi- institutional immune correlate analyses of the successful MHRP RV144 Thai trial that demonstrated that antibodies directed to the HIV-1 gp120 V2 loop correlated with protection against HIV-1 infection, together with previous studies that demonstrated the feasibility of immunoprotection to heroin abuse, MHRP believes that a unique opportunity exists to create a candidate peptide vaccine both to HIV-1 and heroin. As a result of this collaboration, a safe, inexpensive, heroin-hapten-peptide-based, easily manufactured, strongly adjuvanted combination candidate AHV/HIV vaccine product has now been created that is ready for optimization and advanced preclinical testing for anticipated phase I and phase II clinical trials. If successful it is anticipated that this vaccine will provid a deployable heroin vaccine and will represent a major advance for creation of a practical and effective HIV vaccine. The major goals are to: (1) optimize the hapten-gp41/gp120-T helper peptide-adjuvant-carrier formulation by examining the relative immune responses in rodents with three alternative identified lead heroin haptens; (2) perform advanced preclinical immunogenicity studies in rodents with the final lead formulation to examine antibody isotypes, affinities, specificities for heroin and HIV gp41 and gp120-V2 loop epitopes; (3) examine vaccine-induced anti-heroin antibodies for prevention of anesthetic effects and prevention of physiological effects associated with drug overdose in rodents and non-human primates; (4) perform neutralization and other in vitro functional analyses of vaccineinduced anti-HIV antibodies from rodents and non-human primates; and (5) demonstrate the feasibility of inexpensive scaled-up vaccine manufacture for future phase I/II clinical studies.