Engineering viruses to create vaccines: Best Poster win for Hub researcher
Dr Erwan Sallard has been awarded a poster prize at the symposium 'Integrating Chemistry, Engineering and Biology to Create the Next Generation of Vaccines'.
Erwan is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford, and a member of the Engineering Biology for Advanced Therapeutics Hub.
Erwan's work focuses on improving gene delivery vectors to target the mucosal tissues lining the respiratory tract.
Harnessing viruses to create vaccines
Erwan received the Best Poster Overall award for his poster “Harnessing capsid engineering to generate novel adenovirus vaccine vectors optimised for mucosal delivery.”
Viral vector vaccines use a harmless version of a carrier virus, or vector, to deliver specific genetic instructions to human cells. Those instructions help the cells to make proteins known as antigens that can trigger an immune response against a potentially harmful disease-causing virus, teaching the body to recognise and fight it in future.
A key component of these vectors is the capsid, a protein shell that encloses and protects the viral genetic material and determines which cells the virus can enter.
Targeting mucosal tissues
By engineering the capsid, researchers can alter the vector’s properties, including which tissues and cell types it targets and how efficiently it enters cells. Erwan’s research aims to create optimised vectors which more effectively reach and deliver their payload to the tissue lining the respiratory tract, a major entry point for many pathogens and an important site of immune defence.
Erwan has developed and tested new, more effective gene delivery vectors in both mouse models and in vitro human airway liquid–air interface (ALI) cultures. These ALI systems are lab-grown models of the airway lining that closely mimic mucosal tissues, making them valuable for studying respiratory delivery.
A multidisciplinary symposium
Organised through the Royal Society of Chemistry and the Engineering Biology Interdisciplinary Research Centre (EngBioIRC), the symposium brought together physical scientists and life scientists to explore new approaches to vaccine design with potential impact on both human and animal health. Held at Queen’s College, Cambridge, the event hosted around 80 attendees from across the UK, as well as international contributors from Taiwan, China, the United States, Denmark, and France. Alongside academic researchers, the programme also featured innovative UK biotech companies and insights from representatives of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), highlighting the strong translational focus of the meeting.
Reflecting on the event, Erwan noted that the symposium was ideally sized for networking and enabled him to connect with potential collaborators working on more advanced mucosal in vitro models, underscoring the importance of interdisciplinary events for fostering new research collaborations.
