Roadmap for the development of candidate vaccines for FMD

What are we trying to achieve and why? What is the problem we are trying to solve?

To define the role of antibodies in FMD protection

What are the scientific and technological challenges (knowledge gaps needing to be addressed)?

• Develop vaccine that could override maternally derived antibody upon the neonate’s ability to respond to FMD
  vaccination
• Define the roles of non-neutralising antibody-bound virus complexes with immune cells in vivo in target species
• Determine how to achieve optimal IgG class ratios and other determinants protective capacity.
  Setup test to differentiate between Ig isotypes

What approaches could/should be taken to address the research question?

Passive transfer experiments and challenges

What else needs to be done before we can solve this need?

Details of host-pathogen interaction.

Existing knowledge including successes and failures

Protection can be achieved with low Ab titres (memory cells), is the quality of the antibodies what determine cross-reactive responses (avidity), and other cytokines (IFN, IL-12, IL-15).