OxTalks will soon move to the new Halo platform and will become 'Oxford Events.' There will be a need for an OxTalks freeze. This was previously planned for Friday 14th November – a new date will be shared as soon as it is available (full details will be available on the Staff Gateway).
In the meantime, the OxTalks site will remain active and events will continue to be published.
If staff have any questions about the Oxford Events launch, please contact halo@digital.ox.ac.uk
People can develop immunity to malaria following repeated exposure; hence the global search for a vaccine. However, it remains unclear how immunity is acquired. We propose that immunity to Plasmodium falciparum malaria requires specific types of humoral and cell-mediated cooperation, in particular merozoite opsonisation and memory CD4 T cell effector functions. We have investigated our model in longitudinal human population studies from Papua New Guinea (PNG) using in vitro assays of functional immunity. Novel whole-parasite techniques were developed to quantify merozoite opsonisation and functional CD4 T cell memory by 16-parameter flow-cytometry, and data related to clinical and parasitological outcomes. We have identified merozoite opsonisation as a strain-transcending definitive correlate of protective immunity, with up to a 85% decrease in risk of clinical malaria observed. We have measured the frequency, magnitude and breadth of CD4 memory responses to merozoites, including production of IFNγ, TNF and IL-10 and poly- functional T cells. In what is the most comprehensive study of its kind to date, investigating humoral and cell-mediated mechanisms has enabled us to build a detailed model of natural immunity and has identified novel biomarkers that will assist the evaluation of future vaccines.
