Protective Immunity Group
Exploring the remarkable abilities of the immune system, particularly focusing on B cells.
Group Leader
Every day of our lives our immune system is faced with a near impossible dilemma: how can it protect us from all the possible threats we will encounter during our lifetime while avoiding mistakenly targeting our own tissues. This includes threats like cancer which develop within our own tissues as well as a magnitude of possible infectious threats. Some of these infectious threats try to avoid immune detection by camouflaging themselves, while others can strategically mutate or conceal key regions of vulnerability.
The Protective Immunity Group, is dedicated to exploring the remarkable abilities of the immune system, particularly focusing on B cells, which generate antibodies that can effectively safeguard our bodies against various formidable threats. This knowledge is vital in refining the development of safe and potent vaccines targeting emerging diseases. Additionally, we investigate the antibodies produced by individuals whose immune systems struggle to differentiate between infections and our own tissues, resulting in debilitating autoimmune diseases, such as Guillain-Barré syndrome. Understanding these contrasting challenges will guide us in avoiding autoimmune diseases and help develop improved vaccines to combat future threats.
Research team
Dr Deborah Burnett
View ProfileAnia Moxon
View ProfileEllise Roper
View ProfileDr Adrian Chye
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Selected publications
See all publications- 2021Immunity10.1016/j.immuni.2021.10.019
Immunizations with diverse sarbecovirus receptor-binding domains elicit SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies against a conserved site of vulnerability.
- 2020Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America10.1073/pnas.2005102117
Conformational diversity facilitates antibody mutation trajectories and discrimination between foreign and self-antigens.
- 2018Science (New York, N.Y.)10.1126/science.aao3859
Germinal center antibody mutation trajectories are determined by rapid self/foreign discrimination.
- 2020Cell10.1016/j.cell.2020.01.029
Lymphoma Driver Mutations in the Pathogenic Evolution of an Iconic Human Autoantibody.
- 2022Cell10.1016/j.cell.2022.02.018
Getting to the (germinal) center of humoral immune responses to SARS-CoV-2.