Scripps Research awarded $9.8 million by NIH to address deadly bacterial infections
The program grant will support the development of high-affinity antibodies that can target skin and lung infections, as well as sexually transmitted diseases.
July 20, 2023
LA JOLLA, CA – The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has awarded Scripps Research a five-year grant of $9.8 million to pioneer novel immunotherapies against life-threatening and antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections.
The program grant will support multidisciplinary studies that identify therapeutic targets on bacterial pathogens listed by the World Health Organization (WHO) as “critical” or “high” priority. These include Staphylococcus aureus and Klebsiella pneumoniae, which can cause bloodstream infections, pneumonia, or bone and joint infections, and lead to approximately 1.8 million deaths globally each year. Another focus is the bacterium Neisseria gonorrhea, which is estimated to affect over 86 million adults each year globally and is responsible for the disease gonorrhea, one of the leading causes of sterility in women.
“The widespread use of antibiotics has led to the rapid emergence of strains of these bacteria that are now resistant to our most common classes of drugs,” says Luc Teyton, MD, PhD, project lead for the grant and professor of Immunology and Microbiology at Scripps Research. “We need a new, versatile solution that could be leveraged against multiple infections that may emerge down the road.”
Spearheaded by Scripps Research, the research program includes collaborators from multiple institutions across the United States, spanning the fields of chemistry, microbiology, immunology, and structural biology. Together, the scientists will focus on chains of sugars on the bacterial cell surface called glycans, which have emerged as a promising therapeutic target for vaccines and antibiotics.
Teyton and colleagues will identify glycans of interest by chemically deconstructing the molecules and displaying them on an artificial platform for recognition by the immune system. The team will then focus on antibodies that can strongly bind to and neutralize these glycans, as well as novel vaccine candidates, that can be deployed in pre-clinical studies.
“This integrated, multidisciplinary effort could result in a paradigm shift for the way we approach treating serious bacterial infections,” says Teyton. “Since therapeutic options are so limited, we believe this could make a huge difference for public health.”
Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number 1P01AI172525-01. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.
For more information, contact press@scripps.edu