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Pandemic Preparedness Capabilities

Systems-level immunomonitoring to unravel immune response to a novel pathogen


Funding given for project project entitled:

Systems-level immunomonitoring to unravel immune response to a novel pathogen

PI(s)/Head responsible for the resource:

Petter Brodin, Jochen Schwenk

Host organisation(s):

Karolinska Institutet

Resource description:

Early research into SARS-CoV-2 immune responses and the how the immune responses varied among different patients, based on age, sex and prior health status in relation to COVID-19 disease outcome, has been of outmost importance for improved COVID-19 survival rates. The TBy unpacking the complex immune system pathways involved in sensing the SARS-CoV-2 virus, as well as the interference of the virus in antiviral IFN-I responses are examples of immunological findings based on patient-data. In brief, these results are based on results from monitoring how the immune response changes in patients during the course of COVID-19 disease.

The overall aim of this project is to establish and standardise methods for optimal sample collection, data acquisition, and data analysis pipelines for future immune response studies. Healthcare will have ready setup tools, and pipelines, and be prepared to perform systems-immunology studies on novel pathogens. A multi-disciplinary program to establish standardised methods for systems- level monitoring of human immune system will ensure competence and knowledge and allow for rapid responses to potential novel diseases.

Specific project aims:

  1. To establish optimal sample collection protocols for systems-level immunomonitoring
  2. To standardise protocols for global analyses of immune cells and proteins
  3. To develop pipelines for integrative analyses of systems-level immunomonitoring data
  4. To launch a comprehensive service offering for systems-level immunomonitoring
How this resource can be used for Pandemic Preparedness research:

Once this capability has been tested, validated and standardised it can be offered as a service capability and combined offering within the SciLifeLab, Clinical proteomics and immunology platform (see project aim 4).

Contact information:

Petter Brodin
Professor
Email: petter.brodin@ki.se

Jochen Schwenk
Professor
Email: jochen.schwenk@scilifelab.se