Program asks Council approval for the renewal of an initiative titled “Program Project Grants for HIV Research.” We seek to strengthen both existing collaborations and foster new ones in several important areas of NICHD focused HIV research, that will benefit from enhanced multidisciplinary approaches.
The goal of this initiative is to encourage collaborations and stimulate collaborators with a combination of skills, ideas, and resources to use multi-project research programs that address NICHD HIV scientific areas as the well-defined, central research focus or objective of the work and that through synergy amongst projects can yield more robust outcomes than would be expected from a single study or multiple isolated studies. Examples of synergy could include sharing data and methods, technologies, samples, reagents, human subject population(s), mathematical modeling, and use of large data sets which may impact the direction and outcomes of the science and research.
Importantly we intend to encourage participation from a combination of early career HIV investigators, from those who have not traditionally engaged in HIV research and more established HIV investigators, with leadership fairly distributed among the groups.
The previous iterations funded HIV studies on the effect of new antiretrovirals and co-infections on maternal and infant anatomical and neurodevelopmental outcomes, development and cure of the infant HIV reservoir, and Implementation science research focused on community-based point-of-care (POC) HIV testing for infants and viral load testing of women.
This initiative has the potential to address all NICHD’s strategic plan themes and cross cutting areas. It will also align with NIH’s Office of AIDS Research and the Maternal and Pediatric Infectious Disease Branch’s HIV/AIDS priorities.
These areas of research include but are not limited to –
- Research on new and existing antiretrovirals, HIV, co-infections and co-morbidities, and their outcomes in NICHD priority populations.
- Development and validation of methods to predict outcomes and inform intervention strategies for HIV prenatal and pregnancy testing, linkage to care, and treatment (i.e., antiretrovirals, multipurpose-prevention technologies, immune-prophylaxis) to improve reproductive health.
- Basic, biobehavioral, and translational HIV science research to understand altered immune crosstalk in pregnancy, placenta, and fetus, including interaction with environment, biome, nutrition, co-infections, and co-morbidities on the development of the immune system.
- Research on HIV and the many elements including infection, inflammation, cellular, molecular, and paternal factors that influence development of the immune system in utero and during the postnatal period.
Prior Results:
Four different grants were funded. Each grant supports three synergistic research projects (one supported a 4th project). Each grant supports a science core essential to all or most of the research projects providing analytics, measurement, bioinformatics, and data and management support.
Closing Research Gaps in Antiretroviral Treatment for Pregnant Women and Infants Living with HIV Botswana
- Human studies; 4 projects & 1 Data management and Distribution Core
The first grant questions gaps in new antiretroviral treatment for pregnant women and infants living with HIV and proposes an emulated clinical trial that will compare ART regimens in pregnant women by weight strata and assess health outcomes in repeat pregnancies. Other projects will evaluate methodologies to develop reporting criteria for pregnancy surveillance cohorts and new techniques to support target trials. There is a plan to evaluate point-of-care HIV testing and early dolutegravir use in infants and to use Precision Medicine Approaches for Immune Control of Pediatric HIV-1 Infection.
Drug, microbiome, and immune determinants of birth and neurodevelopmental outcomes in children with exposure to HIV infection Kenya
- Human studies; 3 projects & 1 measurement and Analytics Core
The second seeks answers about how ARV’s, microbiome and immune determinants affect birth and neurodevelopmental outcomes in two groups of exposed but uninfected children: those exposed to ARV and HIV, those exposed to ARV only. They are being compared to those exposed to neither. The Influence of infant gut microbiome and breastmilk HMOs on neurodevelopment in children exposed to HIV and the effect of cytomegalovirus, inflammation, and immune activation on neurodevelopment in children exposed to maternal HIV infection are being studied.
Immune determinants of pediatric HIV/SIV reservoir establishment and maintenance Domestic
- NHP studies; 3 projects 1 bioinformatics core
The third grant explores the immune determinants of pediatric HIV/SIV reservoir establishment and maintenance that can aid in efforts to cure HIV. Using in vitro and in vivo models, another project Investigates how the antiviral role of CD8+ T cells in pediatric hosts influences reservoir establishment and maintenance, The third project is a global assessment of host immune parameters and mechanisms that drive virus persistence in pediatric HIV reservoirs. Data from all three projects in this grant will lead to models that identify strategies to control HIV replication after ART interruption in children.
Preventing Infant Infections with Implementation Science in Malawi
- Human studies; 3 projects 1 Implementation & 1 Data Science & Analytical Core
The fourth grant uses implementation science to provide strategies to prevent infant HIV infections. The first project will evaluate the safety of oral and injectable (PrEP) on pregnancy outcomes and infant development during pregnancy and breast-feeding. There is a project to evaluate a PrEP implementation strategy to improve PrEP uptake and persistence among postpartum women and another that will provide a community-based point-of-care (POC) HIV testing for infants and viral load testing of women.
Program Contact
Denise Russo
Maternal and Pediatric Infectious Disease Branch (MPIDB)
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