Karen Norris

Karen Norris, is professor of Infectious Diseases and the Charles H. Wheatley Chair in Immunology & Translational Biomedical Research at the Center for Vaccines and Immunology at the University of Georgia. Her laboratory has developed and is testing a broadly protective vaccine and immunotherapeutic agents to prevent and treat fungal infections, including pulmonary aspergillosis and invasive candidiasis. She holds patents for related technologies and her work has led to the establishment of NXT Biologics, Inc, a company whose goal is advancing life-saving vaccines and immunotherapies for fungal diseases.

Abstract:

Anti-fungal therapies and prophylactic regimens have advanced but remain sub-optimal and increasing frequency of anti-fungal drug resistance is a critical concern. Despite the going concern regarding invasive fungal infections (IFIs), there are no approved fungal vaccines. As populations at high risk of IFIs are susceptible to several fungal organisms, a vaccine that targets pathogens of highest clinical concern is an important goal in anti-fungal vaccine development. The overall goal of this work is to advance a novel broadly reactive vaccine that induces protective immunity to multiple fungal pathogens, including Aspergillus species. The lead candidate is a recombinant protein which was designed based on a conserved protein sequence present in the major fungal pathogens. We have reported that experimental immunization of mice and non-human primates with NXT-2 induces protective immunity against invasive pulmonary aspergillosis, invasive candidiasis and Pneumocystis pneumonia.