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Experiment in laboratory
​ Photo by Louis Reed

NANOVAC Consortium

The NANOVAC consortium, co-ordinated at the Medway School of Pharmacy, aims to produce, optimise and test the biological effects of nanoconjugates and nanovaccines with potential therapeutic applications for treating inflammation, allergy and leukaemia. The consortium has grown rapidly in the past 5 years and already published several high-impact papers on nanomaterials and nanoconjugate-facilitated targeting approaches.

Current departmental members of NANOVAC include Dr. Vadim Sumbayev, Dr. Bernhard Gibbs, Dr. Gurprit Lall and Dr. Vladimir Gubala. Our main external members include Dr. Luigi Calzolai (European Commission JRC, Ispra), Dr. Luca Varani (Institute for Research in Biomedicine, Bellinzona) and Dr Franco Falcone and Dr Snow Stolnik (both at University of Nottingham). We also have two industrial partners, Dr. Sergey Litvinov (Boost Technologies) and Dr. Dimitri Aubert (iZON).

We are currently in the process of preparing proposals for the Horizon 2020 EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation (value > £4 million) in order to develop nanoconjugates and nanovaccines for use as therapies against cancer and allergic diseases. We have also recently applied for an Asthma UK Capacity-Building PhD Studentship entitled “Highly specific targeting of mast cell and basophil function using nanomaterials”.

Recent papers and awards arising from collaboration within the consortium:

  • Sumbayev VV, Yasinska IM, Garcia CP, Gilliland D, Lall GS, Gibbs BF, Bonsall D, Varani L, Rossi F, Calzolai L: Gold nanoparticles downregulate interleukin-1β-induced biological responses. Small, 9:472-477 (2013).
  • Pascual García C, Sumbayev VV, Gilliland D, Yasinska IM, Gibbs BF, Mehn D, Calzolai L, Rossi F: Microscopic Analysis of the Interaction of Gold Nanoparticles with Cells of the Innate Immune System. Sci. Reports (Nature Publishing Group), 3: 1326 DOI: 10.1038/srep01326 (2013).
  • Yasinska IM, Gibbs BF (joint 1st and corresponding author), Lall GS, Sumbayev VV: The HIF-1 transcription complex is essential for translational control of myeloid hematopoietic cell function. Cell. Mol. Life Sci. (In press, 2013).
  • Gibbs BF, Yasinska IM, Calzolai L, Gilliland D, Sumbayev VV: Highly Specific Targeting of Human Leukocytes using Gold Nanoparticle-Based Biologically Active Conjugates. J. Biomed. Nanotechnol. (In press, 2013).
  • Gibbs BF, Calzolai L, Sumbayev VV: Oral presentation prize at the 2013 Annual Meeting of the European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI), Title: “Specific Targeting of Human Allergic Effector Cells using Gold Nanoconjugates”.
  • Gibbs BF, Sumbayev VV: EAACI Research Fellowship Award 2013.

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