Tuesday March 13 from 12.00 to 13.00

Seminar with Arnaud Marchant

"Development of a vaccine against cytomegalovirus"

The development of a vaccine against congenital cytomegalovirus infection is a public health priority. A vaccine against CMV would also benefit patients receiving bone marrow or solid organ transplants. Natural infection confers only partial protection against vertical transmission of CMV and the mechanisms involved remain incompletely understood. The identification of correlates of protection would considerably help in the rational design and in the evaluation of CMV vaccine candidates. Several vaccine candidates are currently evaluated in the clinic. They are primarily based on three viral antigens, the glycoprotein B, the pp65 tegument protein and the immediate early antigen 1. Phase II trials have provided a proof of principle that vaccines can prevent CMV infection and can control CMV replication. The results of a recent phase I trial of a new vaccine candidate will be presented and the future directions for the development of CMV vaccines will be discussed.