Professor Warwick Britton and Associate Professor Jamie Triccas are based at the Centenary Institute and the Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology in the Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney. They have a longstanding collaboration on the development of novel vaccines and drugs against Tuberculosis (TB). They are both members of the NHMRC-funded Centre of Research Excellence in Tuberculosis Control (TB-CRE), based at the Centenary Institute, which focuses on the discovery and evaluation of new tools and interventions to improve TB control and inform public health policy and practice.
Warwick Britton leads the Tuberculosis Research Program at the Centenary Institute in the study of host control of M. tuberculosis and M. leprae infection, mycobacterial antigen discovery, mycobacterial genetics and their application to vaccine development. His group has developed DNA, protein and viral vaccines against TB expressing a range of antigens and different adjuvant strategies. Recently they have investigated the role of pulmonary immunization against TB using protein-adjuvant conjugate vaccines and recombinant viral vaccines to stimulate protective T cells in the lung. He has long-standing interests in the global control of tuberculosis and leprosy, and works with members of the TB-CRE on projects to improve TB control in Vietnam and on studies of genetic susceptibility to TB and new biomarkers for TB disease in Vietnam and China. Dr Manuela Flórido is the senior immunologist in his group.
Jamie Triccas leads the Microbial Pathogenesis and Immunity Group in the Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology. His research program is focused on determining how virulent micro-organisms promote disease, and developing novel strategies to prevent infection. His group has developed recombinant BCG expressing M. tuberculosis antigens and immuno-modulatory cytokines and novel protein vaccines that afford protective efficacy against experimental TB. Most recently they have defined the protective efficacy of novel antigens expressed during the intracellular growth of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. These include enzymes of the Sulphate Assimilation Pathway that are recognised during human M. tuberculosis. Dr Claudio Counoupas and Dr Kelly Prendergast are the senior scientists in the vaccine development program. Both Drs Britton and Triccas collaborate with colleagues in the School of Chemistry at the University of Sydney on the development new anti-mycobacterial drugs.
