New Tuberculosis Vaccine Strategies: Taking Aim at Un-Natural Immunity

Publication date: Available online 9 February 2018
Source:Trends in Immunology
Author(s): Mangalakumari Jeyanathan, Yushi Yao, Sam Afkhami, Fiona Smaill, Zhou Xing
Despite some major progress made in developing tuberculosis (TB) vaccine strategies, with a dozen novel vaccines currently in the clinical pipeline, the world is still missing an effective TB vaccine. This questions whether any major breakthroughs can be achieved without making a drastic departure from the current strategy, which creates a state of 'near-natural immunity', imitating the natural immunity developed after Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) infection. Here, we argue instead that mounting evidence suggests an effective strategy ought to induce a state of all-around 'un-natural' immunity comprising trained innate immunity (TII), tissue-resident memory T cells (TRM), and anti-Mtb surface antibodies in the lung. Thus, here we summarize the latest information, thinking, and development in the field of TB and vaccines.



http://ift.tt/2C5Wtr5