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2008-10-08 Polish vaccines against Enterobacteriacea, Salmonella and Shigella.

Prof. Andrzej Gamian, one of the leading Polish scientists, is focused on infectious diseases and is working on development of new vaccines against bacteria. His laboratory belongs toL. Hirszfeld’s Institute of Immunology and Experimental Therapy (Polish Academy of Sciences) in Wroclaw. Prof. Gamian's group is focused on bacterial wall compounds, like glycolipids, lipopolisacharydes and bacterial surface proteins. This research will hopefully result in improvement of control over infectious diseases.

Prof. Gamian emphasizes practical aspect of his studies: “We are focused on applied research. One of its application will be development of vaccines against infection with bacteria such as Salmonella family, Enterobacteriaceae or Shigella. Another direction of our research is to create broad diagnostic tests based on surface structures of bacteria. Some of cellular components described by our group seem to be useful in diagnosis of immunodeficiency disorders or in seeking autoreactive antibodies. In last case bacterial enolase seems to be particularly interesting Its ability to bind autoreactive antibodies exclude it from potential use in vaccine." The team is also looking for the early heart attack protein markers.

L. Hirszfeld’s Institute of Immunology and Experimental also invented a test for endotoxin presence in environment. Moreover, there are plans to develop diagnostic tests for endotoxins presence during sepsa course.

Apart from biomedical applications of prof. Gamian group research they developed also bacterial media which is based on transformation of by-products.

The team goals are not focused just on publishing results but also on protection of intellectual property. Members of the group are together coauthors of 15 patents. “Currently we are preparing four new patent claims ,and as a team, we have already five patents granted. Further steps depends on financial conditions."- said prof. Gamian.

L. Hirszfeld’s Institute of Immunology and Experimental Therapy is collaborating with several institutes in Poland and abroad. Among those are Jagiellonian University and NIH in the U.S.

M. Mackowski