Nouailles

Geraldine, Peter and Cengiz are delighted to announce that the cutting edge, collaborative study comparing vaccine-elicited immunity to SARS-CoV-2 variants in hamster models is finally published in Nature Microbiology! Many thanks to our key co-operators Julia, Dusan, Emanuel and Jakob at the MDC and FU Berlin! Always a delight working with you! The study evaluates the efficacy of a live-attenuated nasal vaccine, sCPD9, developed by the FU Berlin, in comparison to currently available COVID-19 vaccines including the mRNA vaccine BNT162b2 and the adenovirus-vectored spike vaccine Ad2-spike in hamsters infected with SARS-CoV-2. The findings highlight the extensive mucosal and systemic immunity elicited by the live-attenuated nasal vaccine sCPD9, which results in superior protection of the host compared to other vaccination strategies, following SARS-CoV-2 infection. We hope that this work will pave the way for further investigations of nasal live-attenuated vaccines and the advantages conferred by evoking strong localized and mucosal immunity!

Nouailles, G. et al. (2023). Live-attenuated vaccine sCPD9 elicits superior mucosal and systemic immunity to SARS-CoV-2 variants in hamsters. Nature Microbiology.

It is with a heavy heart that we say farewell to Romina, but we are also delighted to be able to call her our alumni and wish her a very successful future in her new chapter! All the very best Romina!

The team enjoyed presenting their projects at the DGP Congress in Düsseldorf! Thank you to Peter, Romina and Lisa for the valuable representation of our group.

Safe travels to Peter, Lisa and Romina who are on their way to the 63rd DGP Congress in Düsseldorf! Peter will give a talk on „Interspecies analysis to dissect cellular transcriptomic signatures of humans and hamsters in COVID-19“, Romina on „Experimental investigation of adjuvant therapies in severe pneumonia and ventilation“, while Lisa will present her poster titled „Approaching xeno-free cultivation and utilization of pulmonary pathogens in vitro“

It was a great pleasure to attend the 26th Symposium „Infection and Immune Defense“ of the DGfI and DGHM Study Group Infection Immunology at Burg Rothenfels! We gained a lot of insight into the impressive research conducted by all working groups in the field of infection immunology. Many thanks to Prof. Anca Dorhoi for the organization!

Congratulations to Cengiz for having his work describing the role of microRNA-223 in pneumococcal pneumonia published! The scope of this study describes the implications of RNA interference in regulating the murine neutrophil transcriptome, whilst also highlighting the correlation of serum microRNA-223 expression and pneumococcal disease severity in a human cohort. We hope that this work will pave the way to elaborate further on the molecular mechanisms involved in immune cell effector functions during pneumococcal pneumonia, while also helping advance novel treatment options for severe lung infections!

Goekeri, C. et al. (2023). MicroRNA-223 Dampens Pulmonary Inflammation during Pneumococcal Pneumonia. Cells 12.