Vaccine and Immunotherapy Technologies

9-11 April 2008, Canberra

Professor Ian Frazer

Director, Diamantina Institute of Cancer Immunology and Metabolic Medicine, University of Queensland

Ian Frazer trained as a renal physician and clinical immunologist in Edinburgh, Scotland. He moved to Australia in 1981 to continue his clinical training and pursue studies in viral immunology and autoimmunity at The Walter and Eliza Hall institute of Medical Research. Ian moved to Brisbane in 1985 to take up a teaching post with the University of Queensland. Throughout his career, he has pursued an interest in developing vaccines to prevent human papillomavirus (HPV) infection and the papillomavirus related human cancers in the cervix and elsewhere. In 1990, he and his then postdoctoral scientist, Dr Jian Zhou, developed the technology for producing HPV virus-like particles. This technology is now the basis of vaccines recently brought to market to prevent cervical cancer. Ian has also developed two different therapeutic vaccines for chronic HPV infection, both presently in Phase 2 clinical trials in Australia and China. He currently holds a personal chair as head of the Diamantina Institute. His research interests include immunoregulation and immunotherapeutic vaccines, and he teaches immunology to undergraduate and graduate students of the University.

 

Closing remarks

This conference was conceived to bring together a range of experts diverse across the field of vaccine technology, so that we could all learn from each other. I think in that regard it has been a very successful meeting. Parenthetically I might point out that we should probably have some more of these in the future, because I think it has been worthwhile.

I have learned that, while until now we have developed vaccines empirically – we have found out that they worked and then afterwards tried to work out how – we are now exploiting research on the pathogens, the immune system and our understanding of the vaccine technologies, plus the tremendous power of hypothesis-free data crunching, to actually do something a little more scientific in the future and perhaps overcome the problems that we recognise with the vaccines we don’t have at the moment.

Of course, we still have that second challenge of getting the vaccines we do have developed. Gus Nossal laid out very effectively the business plan for that this morning, and I think Norman Swan, at the dinner last night, laid out very effectively how we have to convert that business plan into something a little more emotive in order to motivate people to actually do something about it.

Our mothers taught us that prevention is better than cure. After clean water, vaccines are the single most effective public health measure we have got, and I think that we really need to keep up the effort, even though the challenges seem very substantial for HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis, for example.

This has been a great meeting. Thank you very much, all of you, for coming. We have to thank our hosts, particularly – the Australian Academy of Science and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering – for providing the opportunity, and the Australian government for the money that has facilitated this, and Fenja Theden and her colleagues for organising what I think has been a very excellent meeting from all of our points of view. The environment, the food, the chance to socialise, the chance to get together and talk science have all been excellent.

But I really want to thank all of you for participating, because without you there wouldn’t have been a conference. The organising committee is very grateful that you have chosen to come along and give of your wisdom. I thank you very much for your attendance.

> Back to program