Pioneering vaccine development for prevention of meningococcal disease, a dreaded bacterial infection that causes meningitis and sepsis, Dan Granoff, MD, is investigating the vaccine-potential of new proteins discovered from the genome sequencing project, and the molecular basis of human immunity to group A strains, responsible for epidemic meningococcal disease in Africa.

Using samples gathered from her fieldwork in Nepal, CHORI investigator Deborah Dean, MD, MPH, explores the potential for creating a vaccine for Chlamydia trachomatis, strains of which cause both sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and trachoma, the leading cause of preventable blindness in the world. With more than one tenth of the world’s population ocularly infected with chlamydiae, Dr. Dean’s research has the potential to impact millions.

Ann Petru, MD, director of the Pediatric HIV/AIDS program, leads CHORI in its participation in national and international multi-center trials for HIV/AIDS. As a result of the invaluable gains achieved through these clinical trials, CHORI’s very first HIV/AIDS patient in 1983 celebrated her 24th birthday in 2004. With an estimated 34 million people infected with HIV/AIDS world-wide, novel treatments like those developed at CHORI are critical to both the survival of today’s pediatric patients and to tomorrow’s global populations affected by the disease.

These are but some examples of the depth and breadth of the research conducted in CHORI’s Center for Immunobiology & Vaccine Development, and the extent of its global impact. Explore the links in the sidebar menu to discover all that CHORI’s CIVD brings to translational research.