Institute: Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine
Biography
Pneumonia is a life-threatening disease with high mortality and morbidity among children and elderly worldwide. Despite the current licensed vaccines pneumococcal pneumonia is still the leading cause of death in children under 5 years of age. Therefore, novel and more efficient vaccines are needed. In Liverpool, we use the unique Experimental Human Pneumococcal Carriage model to investigate host-pneumococcus interactions post acquisition of pneumococcal colonisation of nasopharynx. We think that small numbers of pneumococci are present in the nose (“nasal carriage”) can may have a protective effect against disease. Small numbers of pneumococci are often found in the nose of healthy adults (natural carriers) and more often in children. Therefore, we annually recruit over a hundred healthy volunteers and we instil a safe dose of live pneumococci into their nose. For the purposes of our research we use innovative techniques to collect unique samples, such as nasosampling, nasal biopsies and bronchoscopies.
My research focuses on the nasal and lung immune responses post pneumococcal colonisation. I mainly study the dynamics between nasal pneumococcal carriage and host lung immunity, the impact of influenza virus co-infection on pneumococcal colonisation and the overall goal of my ongoing research is the development of a pulmonary delivered universal vaccine against community acquired pneumonia (CAP).
Key Publications
A list of publications can be found here.
Web Links of Interest