?Division of Immunology
?SU Immunology Research Group (SU-IRG)
?
?CURRENT PROJECTS
Cascade
This study aims to investigate the immune mechanism of protection against Myb by characterizing the immune landscape in the lung and draining lymph nodes associated with the capacity to eradicate or control a subsequent Mtb challenge.
MR1 Lung Resident
This study aims to investigate MR1-Restricted T Cells and ssociation with differential outcomes following exposure to Mtb by defining the prevalence and effector function of MR1T cells in the lung and peripheral blood in the setting of exposure to Mtb and HIV.
MR1 Memory
This study aims to investigate the memory phenotype and function of TB-reactive human MR1 restricted cells by determining whether or not CD8+ MR1T cells have features of immunological memory.
MRC SHIP / SATBBI
A South African initiative for the discovery and refinement of biomarkers and to promote Mtb biomarker bioinformatics.
PREDICT TB
This clinical trial uses biomarkers to Predict TB treatment duration. The primary aim of the study is to demonstrate that the 18-month treatment success rate of standard treatment stopped early at week 16 (Arm C) is not inferior to standard treatment stopped at week 24 (Arm B), in participants classified as low risk for disease failure and relapse by radiographic and bacterial load markers. This is a multi-country, multi-site trial, sponsored by SU-IRG.
PriMe
This clinical trial is a multicenter, phase III, double-blind, randomized, active-controlled study to evaluate the efficacy and safety of VPM1002 in comparison to BCG in prevention of Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection in newborn infants.
Triage
This study aims to finalise a POC-MBT TB triage test suitable for global application and to perform field-testing and validation thereof. The target for each validation process will be the World Health Organisation (WHO) target product profile 90% sensitivity and 70% specificity.?
ENDxTB
This UO1 study is led by our team and investigates the diagnostic, treatment response and predictive ability of two point of care tests, the Cepheid MTB HR and Multibiomarker test, based on fingerstick blood MRNA and cytokine levels, respectively in symptomatic adults (TriageTB) and children (ChilDx) as well as in TB patients and their household contacts (EnDx: Exposed) across 4 African sites and in Vietnam.
COMPLETED PROJECTS
AE-TBC
This was an African-European collaboration for discovering new, cost-effective point-of-care diagnostic tests for tuberculosis.
ALERT
Collaboration with researchers at the 肆客足球 of Texas and Texas Biomedical Research Institute to evaluate immune-endocrine dysregulation in Type 2 Diabetes and its impact on immune responses to Mtb in peripheral blood and the lung.
BIOMARKER
A three year study in collaboration with the Catalysis Foundation, to identify biomarkers that correspond to a patient's active TB load for diagnosis and treatment response. This project has been completed.
BIOSIGNATURES
A multinational collaboration focusing on immune and metabolic responses to TB treatment, to discover signatures that distinguish between fast and slow responders, as well as treatment failures and relapsers.
CORTIS-01
The Correlate of Risk Targeted Intervention Study (CORTIS) is a randomized, partially-blinded, clinical trial of Isoniazid and Rifapentine (3HP) therapy to prevent pulmonary Tuberculosis in high-risk individuals identified by a transcriptomic correlate of risk. SU-IRG is one of 5 trials sites; the sponsor is UCT SATVI.
CORTIS-HR
The validation of correlates of risk of TB disease in high-risk populations (CORTIS-HR) is a companion study of the CORTIS-01 trial that looks at whether the prognostic correlate of risk (COR) status differentiates HIV infected persons with cumulative prevalent or incident TB disease from those without TB disease. This is also a multi-site South African study sponsored by UCT SATVI.
FACSCAP
A study in collaboration with BECTON DICKINSON AND COMPANY analysed blood samples from patients on TB treatment, to identify the regulation of several surface markers expressed on peripheral blood cells by BD FACSCAP technology flow cytometry.
GC6
A multinational collaboration on a large cohort of TB patients and their household contacts for discovery of biomarkers of Mtb infection and disease. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27017310
IMPAACT P1041
P1041 was a Phase II/III ra ndomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical research study of African infants exposed perinatally to HIV. The study was designed to determine the efficacy of isoniazid (INH) in preventing tuberculosis disease and latent tuberculosis infection.
IMPAACT P1073
Study of Immune Reconstitution Inflammatory Syndrome (IRIS) for International Sites Initiating Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy (HAART) in Infants and Children < 72 Months of Age .
NEXGEN
The NexGen EBA aims to use Radiologic and immunologic biomarkers to enhance early bactericidal activity measurements of sterilizing drug activity in tuberculosis.
RePORT / CORdynamics
This is a sub-study of The Correlate of Risk Targeted Intervention Study (CORTIS) and the PredictTB clinical trials, and aims to evaluate the dynamics of a qRT-PCR based transcriptomic signature of TB disease risk.
SCREEN TB
This observational study is an evaluation of host biomarker-based point-of-care tests for targeted screening for active TB. This diagnostic study developed from the AETBC study, aims to test the accuracy, sensitivity and specificity of the TransDot finger-prick test when compared with the composite gold standard tests. It is a multi-site South African study, sponsored by SU-IRG.
TANDEM
A 4 year multinational collaboration focused on unravelling the causal link between active TB disease and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus. It utilizes bi-directional screening – that is screening TB patients for Diabetes and screening Diabetes patients for Mtb to investigate interactions between these two diseases.
TBVAC
Multinational collaboration to identify correlates of (vaccine-induced) protection for active TB.
TESA II
Trials of Excellence in Southern Africa (TESA) is a regional network established in 2009, funded by the European and Developing Countries Clinical trials Partnerships (EDCTP), with the objectives to create a framework for collaboration, capacity building and training among institutions from Southern African countries. TESA II aims to develop, strengthen and expand clinical research capacities in the Southern Region of Africa, through the consolidation of the TESA node of excellence, for conducting clinical trials with the highest research standards in those infectious diseases responsible for the highest morbidity and mortality in the region.
VPM1002-ZA-2.13TB
Collaboration in a Phase IIb trial to assess immunogenicity and safety of the VPM1002 BCG replacement vaccine in newborns.
