Project description:Assessment of the effect of Kaposi-sarcoma herpesvirus upon the transcriptome of lymphatic endothelial cells and its contribution to the transcriptome of Kaposi sarcoma.
Project description:Kaposi sarcoma (KS) is a tumor caused by Kaposi sarcoma herpesvirus (KSHV), also known as human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8). Unlike other virus-associated tumors, where disease progression often continues even after viral eradication, KS requires the persistent presence of KSHV for disease progression. This unique dependency underscores the potential of strategies targeting the virus to also target the tumor. This study aims to characterize the expression of KSHV viral proteins and identify factors associated with differences in viral gene expression, ultimately formulating treatment targets.
Project description:Identification of the relationships of Kaposi sarcoma (KS), normal skin to various cell cultures. The effects of KS herpes virus, the infectious cause of KS, on infected endothelial cells are also investigated.
Project description:The development of a prophylactic vaccine for Kaposi sarcoma-associated Herpesvirus (KSHV) would prevent consequences from infection including disorders such as Kaposi sarcoma and primary effusion lymphoma. Here, we study the immunogenicity of noninfectious virus-like vesicles (VLVs) of KSHV as a potential future vaccine platform. VLVs present a repertoire of viral structural proteins but are noninfectious due to a defect in capsid formation that prevents viral DNA packaging. Immunization of mice with adjuvanted VLVs results in virus-specific antibodies and T cells. These antibodies neutralize viral infection, and this neutralization is enhanced by the complement system. Complement-enhanced neutralization is dependent on antibodies targeting the SCR region of viral ORF4. However, this activity was not present in serum from KSHV-infected humans. Our study highlights an important role of antibody effector functions in the development of a future KSHV vaccine
Project description:Agilent whole exome hybridisation capture will be performed on genomic DNA derived from Kaposi sarcoma cancer and matched normal DNA from the same patients. Next Generation sequencing will be performed on the resulting exome libraries and mapped to build 37 of the human reference genome to facilitate the identification of novel cancer genes
