Publications by authors named "S Maslesa-Galic"

Unlabelled: Melioidosis, caused by the intracellular bacterial pathogen and Tier 1 select agent (Bp), is a highly fatal disease endemic in tropical areas. No licensed vaccine against melioidosis exists. In preclinical vaccine studies, demonstrating protection against respiratory infection in the highly sensitive BALB/c mouse has been especially challenging.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Oral delivery of an inexpensive COVID-19 vaccine can significantly boost immunization rates in low- and middle-income countries needing easy access to vaccines.
  • The rLVS Δ/MN vaccine uses a bacterial vector to express key proteins from the SARS-CoV-2 virus and has shown effectiveness through oral, intradermal, and intranasal administration in preventing severe disease in hamsters.
  • This vaccine strategy could help address ongoing challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic by providing a solution that is cost-effective, easy to distribute, and resistant to emerging viral variants.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) infects one-third of the world's population and is a leading cause of death from a single infectious agent. New TB vaccines are urgently needed to augment immunity conferred by the current modestly protective BCG vaccine. We have developed live attenuated recombinant Listeria monocytogenes (rLm)-vectored TB vaccines expressing five [Mpt64/23.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Mycobacterium tuberculosis infects approximately one-third of the world's population, causing active tuberculosis (TB) in ~10 million people and death in ~1.5 million people annually. A potent vaccine is needed to boost the level of immunity conferred by the current Mycobacterium bovis BCG vaccine that provides moderate protection against childhood TB but variable protection against adult pulmonary TB.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

To generate an inexpensive readily manufactured COVID-19 vaccine, we employed the LVS ΔcapB vector platform, previously used to generate potent candidate vaccines against Select Agent diseases tularemia, anthrax, plague, and melioidosis. Vaccines expressing SARS-CoV-2 structural proteins are constructed using the LVS ΔcapB vector, a highly attenuated replicating intracellular bacterium, and evaluated for efficacy in golden Syrian hamsters, which develop severe COVID-19-like disease. Hamsters immunized intradermally or intranasally with a vaccine co-expressing the Membrane and Nucleocapsid proteins and challenged 5 weeks later with a high dose of SARS-CoV-2 are protected against severe weight loss and lung pathology and show reduced viral loads in the oropharynx and lungs.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF