Roadmap for the development of candidate vaccines for FMD

What are we trying to achieve and why? What is the problem we are trying to solve?

The discovery of new adjuvants to improve the efficacy and safety of current inactivated FMD vaccines

What are the scientific and technological challenges (knowledge gaps needing to be addressed)?

• Identify physiologically relevant adjuvants generating both a strong VN Ab and a CTC response.
• Investigate the relation of adjuvants with the speed and robustness of response, and longevity of protection from challenge.
• Investigate if adjuvants could improve vaccine efficacy in pigs.
• Technological transfer pipelines between research and industry.
• Investigate mode of action of adjuvants

What approaches could/should be taken to address the research question?

• Immune response to antigens delivered on Nanoparticles
• Immune response following inclusion of various adjuvants with the candidate vaccines including molecular adjuvants for DNA/RNA vaccines

What else needs to be done before we can solve this need?

• Identity of protective antigens
• Identity of mechanism of protection

Existing knowledge including successes and failures

FMD vaccines formulated with aluminum hydroxide provide satisfactory results in European cattle, but are less effective in pigs. Oil adjuvants were developed to increase the potency of FMD vaccines in pigs. Not much progress has been done in terms of new adjuvants and formulations in the past few years