On Aug. 2, 2018, Emory University and GeoVax Labs partnered to develop a vaccine for HPV, with an emphasis on head and neck cancer. The GeoVax/Emory collaboration included testing GeoVax’s MVA-VLP-HPV vaccine candidates in therapeutic animal models of HPV in the laboratory of Rafi Ahmed, director of the Emory Vaccine Center.

Ahmed is a world-renowned immunologist whose work in the past 10 years has fostered an understanding of memory T cell differentiation and T and B cell-mediated antiviral immunity.

GeoVax’s vaccine technology is based on its Modified Vaccinia Ankara, or MVA, Virus-Like Particle, or VLP, platform, which generates noninfectious VLPs in the individual being vaccinated.

Gene sequences of target antigens are inserted into the MVA genome, which drives their expression in infected cells. In addition, GeoVax introduces into the viral genome matrix sequences that incorporate antigens into VLPs and simultaneously facilitate their budding from the membranes of infected cells. In this way, vaccination induces two pools of antigens as targets for the immune response – virus-infected cells and released VLPs. This strategy mimics a natural viral infection, triggering the body to produce a robust and durable immune response with involvement of both antibodies and T cells, the company said .

In related immuno-oncology studies in rodent solid tumor models, combination therapy consisting of the GeoVax vaccine designed to target MUC1-secreting tumors plus an anti-PD1 antibody and a protein supplied by ViaMune, successfully arrested progressive growth of the targeted tumors, according to the company.