Faculty Directory

Research

1. Enhancing the immunogenicity of HIV VLPs. By enhancing the incorporation of HIV envelop glycoprotein (Env), stabilizing the natural conformation of Env, and co-incorporating immune stimulators into HIV VLPs, I investigate an integrated approach in eliciting broadly protective immune responses against HIV. The final goal of this study is to develop an affordable HIV vaccine.

2. Studying universal influenza vaccines. I focus my research direction on how to design new influenza vaccines to expose conserved epitopes to the immune system, and how to stimulate the immune system to produce strong immune responses conferring broad cross protection. I will use VLPs/nanoparticles as platforms to integrate multiple conserved epitopes and immune stimulators into the same particles, and study the broad protection induced by the novel VLPs.

3.Incorporating the reticulocyte binding-like (RBL) protein/domains of malarial merozoites into VLPs as malaria vaccines. Malarial merozoites gain entry into host red blood cells through specific receptor-ligand interactions. Immunity specific to RBL would block the entry step, which is necessary to this parasite’s life cycle. Now I am studying how to incorporating RBL protein/domains into VLPs as malaria vaccines.