Genocea Biosciences (Genocea) has received a grant from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s (UPMC) sexually transmitted infections (STI) cooperative research center for the development of vaccines for chlamydia trachomatis.
The company said that Genocea will be working with the UPMC STI Cooperative Research Center’s principal investigator, Toni Darville, chief of the division of pediatric infectious diseases at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh and a professor of pediatrics and immunology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and Tom Cherpes, assistant professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and a researcher at Magee-Womens Research Institute.
The company claims that in November 2009, UPMC received a $12.5m grant from the National Institutes of Health to establish the UPMC STI cooperative research center to advance the understanding of the pathogenesis, diagnosis, prevention, control, and treatment of sexually transmitted infections and associated syndromes.
Staph Leavenworth Bakali, president and chief executive officer of Genocea, said: “We look forward to collaborating with Dr Darville, an internationally recognised chlamydia researcher, in tackling the most reported sexually transmitted infection of bacterial origin in the US.
“Our research to date serves as the foundation of this collaboration and highlights Genocea’s demonstrated ability to rapidly identify proprietary, novel Chlamydia antigens that are protective or associated with disease progression in patients, and may play a role in the development of a vaccine for this disease. This collaboration complements ongoing preclinical studies based on already identified novel antigens.”