|
Systems biology of vaccination for seasonal influenza in humans
|
 |
|
Helder I Nakaya,
Jens Wrammert, Eva K Lee, Luigi Racioppi, Stephanie Marie-Kunze, W Nicholas Haining,
Anthony R Means, Sudhir P Kasturi, Nooruddin Khan, Gui-Mei Li, Megan McCausland,
Vibhu Kanchan, Kenneth E Kokko, Shuzhao Li, Rivka Elbein, Aneesh K Mehta, Alan Aderem,
Kanta Subbarao, Rafi Ahmed & Bali Pulendran.
|
|
Nature Immunology, 2011, 12(8):786-795. |
|
ISV nomination statement
|
|
A major challenge in vaccinology is that the effectiveness
of vaccination can only be ascertained after vaccinated individuals have been exposed
to infection. In 2009, Bali Pulendran and colleagues pioneered the use of a systems
biological approach to study the global picture of the immune response to one of
the most successful human vaccines ever developed, the live attenuated vaccine against
yellow fever (Nat Immunol. 2009 Jan;10(1):116-25). Using this approach the investigators
were able to identify signatures of gene expression in the blood of healthy humans,
a few days after vaccination that could predict with up to 90 percent accuracy the
strength of the immune response, weeks or months after yellow fever vaccination.
In this ISV Paper of the Year (Nat Immunol. 2011 Jul 10;12(8):786-95), the same
group, in collaboration with the group of Rafi Ahmed (an ISV member) and colleagues,
now extend this approach to the seasonal influenza vaccines over the course of three
influenza seasons. By studying gene expression patterns in the blood a few days
after vaccination, the investigators were able to identify “signatures” that were
capable of predicting the magnitude of the later immune response, with >90% accuracy.
Importantly one of the genes in the signature, CAMK4 whose expression was negatively
correlated with antibody titers, revealed an unappreciated role for CAMK4 in B cell
responses. This landmark study, together with the previous work from the same group,
demonstrates the use of systems biological approaches in predicting vaccine efficacy,
and highlights one of the ways for the future of vaccinology - use of systems biology
tools to perform sophisticated human studies that gives specific hypothesis to be
tested experimentally |
|