In 2014, the Wesfarmers Centre of Vaccines & Infectious Diseases put out a first call for seed funding proposals. Five applicants were successful, and were awarded $15,000 each for activities supporting subsequent research grant applications.
(in alphabetical order)
Katie Attwell | Murdoch University / Honorary Fellow of The Kids Research Institute Australia
Tom Snelling (The Kids Research Institute Australia), Claire Waddington (The Kids Research Institute Australia), Kerrie Wylie (University of Sydney), and Julie Leask (University of Sydney).
There is evidence that new parents make their decision on immunizing their child early, still during pregnancy. This research team will use the seed funding to produce a systematic review on the immunization information seeking behaviour of expectant parents and midwives' perspectives and practices herein. This will support a funding application to develop targeted interventions to better engage midwives as advocates of immunisation for expectant and new parents.
Anthony Bosco | The Kids Research Institute Australia
Jonathan Carapetis (The Kids Research Institute Australia), Gabriela Minigo (Menzies School of Health Research, Darwin), Willy-John Martin (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, Melbourne), and Ian Wicks (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, Melbourne).
The research team will use the seed funding to generate preliminary data supporting a NHMRC project grant application employing a state-of-the-art systems biology approach to identify the inflammatory mechanisms that underpin the pathogenesis of acute rheumatic fever leading to progression to rheumatic heart disease (RHD). Aboriginal Australians suffer one of the highest rates of RHD in the world.
Mark Everard | University of Western Australia
Angela Fonceca (University of Western Australia/Honorary Fellow The Kids Research Institute Australia), Abha Chopra (Murdoch University), and Susan Prescott (The Kids Research Institute Australia).
Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) remains one of the most important childhood pathogens for which there is no effective vaccine or treatment. The research team will use the seed funding to complete their potentially paradigm-shifting preliminary findings that RSV can survive in a latent form in human DCs and can be transmitted by pregnant women to their unborn child. These data will form the foundation for future grant applications to prove this potential breakthrough in considered routes of RSV transmission and infection.
Charlene Kahler | University of Western Australia / Honorary Fellow The Kids Research Institute Australia
Timothy Perkins (University of Western Australia), George Milne (University of Western Australia), Anthony Keil (PathWest), David Speers (PathWest), and Ben Howden (University of Melbourne).
Seed funding will be used to genotype meningococcal isolates from Victoria and compare these with data from WA. Understanding similarities or differences in circulating strains causing meningococcal disease in different states will inform the research team in the approach to take in their NHMRC application to construct a meningococcal disease model predicting the (cost-) effectiveness of new meningococcal vaccines such as Bexsero®.
Anthony Kicic | The Kids Research Institute Australia
Ingrid Laing (The Kids Research Institute Australia and School of Paediatrics and Child Health, University of Western Australia), Belinda Hales (The Kids Research Institute Australia), Yury Bochkov (University of Wisconsin, USA), and James Gern (University of Wisconsin, USA).
The seed funding will facilitate this research team learn and establish at the Institute a technique to culture human rhinovirus-C (HRV-C) that has been developed by the collaborators from the University of Wisconsin, USA. Having this HRV-C culture technique in-house will facilitate further studies of the team into HRV related mechanisms of disease and development of treatment models. HRV-C is one of the most common pathogenic viral causes of childhood respiratory diseases.