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Due to the disorganized nature of blood vessels that run through tumors, chemotherapeutic agents often fail to penetrate tumors and kill cancer cells at the tumor’s center. This can lead to ineffective chemotherapeutic treatments, because tumors can quickly grow back if the entire tumor is not destroyed. NIH researchers have developed a therapeutic agent that solves this problem facing current chemotherapy treatments.

Noroviruses are now recognized as the major cause of non-bacterial gastroenteritis in all age groups, and efforts are underway to develop an effective vaccine. The lack of a robust cell culture system for human noroviruses has complicated vaccine development. Hence, norovirus virus like particles (VLPs) have played an important role in the understanding of virus structure, immune response, antigenic diversity, and vaccine design.

The invention is an imaging agent and method of use for imaging blood pools and the lymphatic system. The imaging agent binds with high affinity to serum albumin, the most abundant serum protein, and can be tagged with several isotopes making it suitable for magnetic resonance imaging or positron emission tomographic imaging. To date, only very few blood-pool tracers have been introduced for positron emission tomography. The existing ones have short half-lives (20.4 min for ¹¹C and 2.05 min for ¹⁵O) and thus can only be used in centers with an in-house cyclotron.

The invention relates to a combination hybrid computer tomography (CT) system that is particularly suited for elucidating stages in pulmonary diseases, notably cystic fibrosis and lung cancer. Improved visualization of lung parenchyma and the margins of lung cysts (non-invasive “virtual biopsy”) may provide sufficient detail to distinguish the types of cystic lesions such that the typical lung tissue pathologic biopsy would not be needed to make a diagnosis.

Inhibiting the ability of HIV-1, the virus that causes AIDS, to infect cells is one approach to both prevention and treatment of HIV. Scientists at the NIAID Vaccine Research Center have isolated and characterized neutralizing antibodies (VRC01, 02, 03, and 07) that bind to the CD4 binding site of HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein gp120. These human monoclonal antibodies can potentially be used as a therapeutic to: (1) treat an HIV infection, (2) decrease and prevent HIV-transmission from mother to infant, and (3) be effectively combined with anti-retroviral drug therapy.

A plasmid encodes human C-C motif chemokine receptor 3 (CCR3). It may contribute to the accumulation and activation of eosinophil and other inflammatory cells in the allergic airway.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has invented three chlamydial vaccine technologies, which have shown promising preclinical efficacy. Chlamydia trachomatis infection is the most common sexually transmitted bacterial infection. If left untreated, chlamydia infection can lead to pelvic inflammatory disease and infertility. Chlamydia is also the leading cause of preventable blindness in the world. Despite increased surveillance, prevalence continues to increase, and the need to develop an effective chlamydial vaccine remains.

Technologies:

Rotaviral infection is the most common gastrointestinal illness of children in the world, affecting both developed and developing economies. There is no specific drug treatment for rotavirus infection. Vaccination and good hygiene are key to prevention.

Human respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) continues to be the leading viral cause of severe acute lower respiratory tract disease in infants and children worldwide. A licensed vaccine or antiviral drug suitable for routine use remains unavailable. This invention relates to the use of murine pneumonia virus (MPV), a virus to which humans normally are not exposed to and that is not cross-protected with RSV, as a vector to express the RSV fusion (F) glycoprotein as an RSV vaccine candidate. The RSV F ORF was codon optimized.

With respect to quantification of metabolites in the brain, conventional methods of magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) yield results that are highly variable and highly dependent on the sequence type being applied. This invention describes a novel MRS technique that involves preparing longitudinal steady states at different flip angles using trains of RF pulses interspersed with field gradients to quantify metabolites.