Understanding influenza A virus: linking transmission, evolutionary dynamics, pathogenesis and immunity in pigs

Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.

Swine influenza attracts considerable public attention because of the threat of zoonotic infections causing human pandemics. During the most recent pandemic, a fear that viruses emerging from pigs may infect people resulted in the widespread destruction of animals and trade bans. The primary disease caused by influenza virus in usually mild, but results in greater susceptibility to secondary infections. Vaccination will be a key control measure to improve general herd health, however, such vaccination is not routinely performed in Europe mainly for two reasons: the cost benefit has not been demonstrated and it is not clear that the available vaccines will protect against the strains currently circulating, for example the pandemic H1N1 antigen. Our studies will provide essential evidence to design control programmes, most notably: i) how efficient are the current prophylactic methods at controlling the spread of infection; ii) what level of immunity is required in a population to prevent the spread of infection and the evolution of new strains of virus and iii) determine whether new, broadly cross protective vaccines are more effective at controlling influenza infections in swine. As part of our studies we will perform a series of transmission studies with naïve donors, determining the optimal exposure time for transmission, the immunopathology associated with the onset and cessation of transmission, and determine the efficacy of vaccines to block transmission. Further we will study the evolutionary dynamics through transmission chains in naïve and vaccinated animals and model influenza transmission in both naïve and immune pig populations. We can then apply this new knowledge to population wide models of disease spread to predict the efficiency of any proposed control measures and inform the design of novel vaccines. Our studies will provide essential evidence to design control programmes for influenza in pigs and further control measures for other mammalian hosts.

unavailable