Mucosal Immunology

A major focus of the Mucosal Immunology laboratory is to unpack the correlates of risk or protection to HIV in the female genital tracts of participants from the various clinical trial and cohort follow-up studies that tested various HIV prevention modalities. These include the landmark CAP0041% tenofovir gel trial, the first in human safety trial testing a subtype C derived broadly neutralizing antibody- CAP256V2LS in combination with VRC07-523LS and oral formulations of pre-exposure prophylaxis such as Truvada in the CAP082 and CAP084 studies.  Here we focus on the immunological characteristics of B-cell responses such as antibodies and T cell- responses such as the immune cell activation and consequences of immune cell activation such as genital inflammation. A core of many immunological studies has been both the identification of genital inflammation as a key risk factor for HIV acquisition and testing the robustness of genital inflammation from the various clinical trials as a factor that undermines various formulations of PrEP.