European project aims to develop innovative vaccines and diagnostics for livestock reproductive diseases
The goal of a 5-year project involving 16 partners representing 7 European countries (Italy, UK, Spain, France, Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland) is to develop new and improved vaccines and diagnostic tools to better control livestock reproductive diseases with worldwide impact.
The REPRODIVAC project, funded through the Horizon Europe framework programme, will focus on four priority diseases: porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome, Q fever, ovine enzootic abortion, and porcine brucellosis.
The consortium spans academia and industry with complementary expertise including structural biology, microbiology, immunology, plant and veterinary sciences. This will enable an interdisciplinary approach: (1) applying reverse and structural vaccinology to select and design vaccine and diagnostic candidate antigens; (2) exploiting relevant protein expression systems to produce these antigens; (3) developing rationally attenuated and viral vectored vaccines; and (4) setting-up a suite of molecular and immunological diagnostic tests, including point-of-care tests (PoC), to discriminate vaccinated from infected animals (DIVA).
The new vaccines and diagnostics will be further developed and made accessible to users by the industrial partners involved in the project.
The research is coordinated by ENEA, the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development.
The other participants include: Wageningen University & Research, University of Lleida, Centre D’estudis Porcins, Ceva Animal Health, Friedrich Loeffler Institut, Centro De Investigacion Y Tecnologia Agroalimentaria De Aragón, University of Navarra, University of Murcia, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Associacio Porcsa-Grup de Sanejament Porcì, CZ Veterinaria S.A. – CZ Vaccines, Global DX Ltd, The Pirbright Institute, Moredun Research Institute and École normale supérieure de Lyon.
For more information about the project, see: https://www.reprodivac.eu/
[SOURCE: ENEA]