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STELLENBOSCH UNIVERSITY
STELLENBOSCH, 7600
Unclaimed
Other Than Small Business
Prime contracting experience
1 record from government sources. Past participation is not evidence of current teaming interest.
| Role | Agency | Description | Vehicle | Obligated | Action date | Period |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Prime | Department of Defense Defense Health Agency | IGF::OT::IGF HEMOPURE&BIOPLASMA FDP STUDIES | — | $8,220,995 | Jun 10, 2025 | Sep 27, 2018 – Dec 26, 2025 |
Contract vehicles are shown only when present in the source record. Linked award numbers and vehicles open the authoritative record on USAspending.gov.
Subcontracting experience
11 records from government sources. Past participation is not evidence of current teaming interest.
| Role | Agency | Description | Vehicle | Obligated | Action date | Period |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | STATEMENT OF WORK – YEAR 7 (BASE)
THE DU PLESSIS/WALZL LABORATORY AT STELLENBOSCH UNIVERSITY (SU) WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CLINICAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL WORK (INCLUDING ON-SITE DATA MANAGEMENT) OF THE PROJECT. SU WILL COORDINATE THE STUDY DESIGN, PARTICIPANT SCREENING AND ENROLLMENT FOR THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, PERFORM BRONCHOSCOPIES AND MANAGE SAMPLE SHARING TO PARTICIPATING SITES. SU WILL PROVIDE INPUT IN THE DESIGN, EXECUTION AND DATA ANALYSIS OF IMMUNOLOGICAL STUDIES AND PARTICIPATE IN THE LEADERSHIP TEAM OF “CASCADE IMPAC-TB” CENTER. SU WILL INTERACT AND COORDINATE ALL PROJECT ACTIVITIES WITH THE PI OF THE PROJECT. DR. DU PLESSIS AND DR. WALZL, THE SU CO-PI’S WILL REVIEW ALL RAW DATA GENERATED BY THE SU TEAM, AND SUPERVISE THE LABORATORY WORK, AND THE RESEARCH TECHNICIANS. SPECIFIC DELIVERABLES FOR YEAR 7 OF THE CONTRACT AT SU INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:
A. RECRUITMENT:
SU WILL CONDUCT PET/CT, BRONCHOSCOPY AND PHLEBOTOMY IN ALL COHORTS TO COVER THE FULL SPECTRUM OF INFECTION AND OBTAIN BAL AND PBMC SAMPLES FROM EACH. RECRUITMENT HAS BEEN COMPLETED, AND NO NEW PARTICIPANTS ARE BEING ENROLLED. HOWEVER, WE ARE FOLLOWING UP SELECTED PARTICIPANTS TO SCREEN FOR TB PROGRESSION WITH LONGITUDINAL SAMPLING, REQUIRING ETHICS APPROVAL AND LIMITED CONTINUED CLINICAL INVOLVEMENT.
B. END-ASSAYS:
IMMUNOPHENOTYPING EXPERIMENTS – ONE OF THE DELIVERABLES AT SU IS TO CONDUCT DEEP PHENOTYPING OF PAIRED BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) AND PBMC FROM THE VARIOUS CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY CLINICAL GROUPS. SU HAS EVALUATED THE ASSAY PRIORITY LIST, AS WELL AS THE BAL AND PBMC SAMPLES COLLECTED FROM PARTICIPANTS ENROLLED IN THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, TO ENUMERATE THE NUMBER OF STORED SAMPLES AVAILABLE FOR THE OBJECTIVES RELATED TO THE PROPOSED PLANS FOR THIS END-ASSAY. OF ALL MAIN STUDY PARTICIPANTS FROM WHICH PAIRED BAL AND PBMC HAVE BEEN COLLECTED, SUFFICIENT CELL NUMBERS WERE OBTAINED FROM 88% OF PARTICIPANTS, WHICH INCLUDES MAKING USE OF RESIDUALLY STORED BAL CELLS. WE WILL PERFORM MULTIPARAMETER FLOW CYTOMETRY ANALYSES ON UNFRACTIONATED BAL CELLS AND PBMC SAMPLES FROM A SUBSET OF INDIVIDUALS FROM THE CASCADE CLINICAL GROUPS ALL COHORTS TO DEFINE THE PHENOTYPE OF LUNG RESIDENT AND CIRCULATING LYMPHOCYTE POPULATIONS. IMMUNE PHENOTYPING OF THESE SU HHC PBMC SAMPLES FOR THE LYMPHOID FLOW CYTOMETRY PANEL WILL BE COMPLETED BY MARCH 2026.
GRANULOMA MODEL/KILLING ASSAYS – SU WILL MAKE USE OF THE IN VITRO GRANULOMA MODEL ALONG WITH PARALLEL ASSESSMENTS IN MONOLAYER CULTURE AND UNFRACTIONATED PBMC AND BAL, TO ASSESS MTB KILLING AMONGST THE VARIOUS CLINICAL GROUPS. INTERESTING FINDINGS RELATED TO MTB CONTROL WILL BE TESTED IN FUTURE IN GRANULOMA MODEL EXPERIMENTS. BY USING CLINICAL SAMPLES FROM PARTICIPANTS NOT ELIGIBLE ACCORDING TO THE CASCADE HHC STUDY CRITERIA, SU HAS OPTIMIZED THE MODEL AND ALSO IMPLEMENTED CHANGES TO STREAMLINE BACTERIAL LOAD ASSESSMENT THROUGH MGIT CULTURE. SU HAS COMPLETED THE KILLING ASSAY EXPERIMENTS FOR A QUARTER OF ALL SU HHC SAMPLES FROM 4 CLINICAL GROUPS BY THE END OF PERIOD 6 AND WILL REVIEW FINDINGS FROM THIS SUBSET OF THE COHORT PRIOR TO CONTINUING THE KILLING ASSAYS IN THE FINAL YEAR (PERIOD 7 ONWARDS).
C. OTHER LABORATORY WORK: THE RNASEQ DATA FROM THE BAL AM AND PAX SAMPLES COLLECTED FROM THE SU CASCADE HHC STUDY, ARE BEING GENERATED IN THREE RANDOMIZED BATCHES. DATA FROM ALL 3 BATCHES HAVE BEEN RECEIVED AND ARE BEING ANALYZED BY LOCAL BIOINFORMATICIANS, IT HAS BECOME EVIDENT THAT THE COMPLEXITY OF THE DATA REQUIRES MORE ADVANCED COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSES TO ACHIEVE RELIABLE AND FAST RESULTS. DUE TO THE REDUCED CLINICAL ACTIVITIES AT SU DURING PERIOD 6, THE SCOPE OF THE SU BUDGET WILL ALLOW THE STELLENBOSCH TEAM TO INVOLVE MORE EXPERIENCED/HIGH LEVEL ANALYSTS TO ASSIST WITH RNASEQ ANALYSES AND OMICS DATA INTEGRATION. OTHER WORK NOT PART OF THE ORIGINAL CONTRACT OBJECTIVES BUT FEEDING INTO THE ORIGINAL CASCADE AIMS AND WITH INTERESTING OUTCOMES RESULTING FROM COLLABORATIONS WITH OTHER CASCADE G SUB00002538 Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: WA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $422,035 | Nov 19, 2025 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | THE DU PLESSIS/WALZL LABORATORY AT STELLENBOSCH UNIVERSITY (SU) WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CLINICAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL WORK (INCLUDING ON-SITE DATA MANAGEMENT) OF THE PROJECT. SU WILL COORDINATE THE STUDY DESIGN, PARTICIPANT SCREENING AND ENROLLMENT FOR THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, PERFORM BRONCHOSCOPIES AND MANAGE SAMPLE SHARING TO PARTICIPATING SITES. SU WILL PROVIDE INPUT IN THE DESIGN, EXECUTION AND DATA ANALYSIS OF IMMUNOLOGICAL STUDIES AND PARTICIPATE IN THE LEADERSHIP TEAM OF €œCASCADE IMPAC-TB€Ͽ½ CENTER. SU WILL INTERACT AND COORDINATE ALL PROJECT ACTIVITIES WITH THE PI OF THE PROJECT. DR. DU PLESSIS AND DR. WALZL, THE SU CO-PI€„¢S WILL REVIEW ALL RAW DATA GENERATED BY THE SU TEAM, AND SUPERVISE THE LABORATORY WORK, AND THE RESEARCH TECHNICIANS. SPECIFIC DELIVERABLES FOR YEAR 6 OF THE CONTRACT AT SU INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:
A. RECRUITMENT: THE ANTICIPATED SCREENING AND RECRUITMENT GOALS HAVE BEEN ACHIEVED AND EXCEEDED. WHILE THE INITIAL RECRUITMENT TARGET WAS SET AT 20 PARTICIPANTS FOR EACH OF THE 8 CLINICAL GROUPS (N=160 TOTAL), WE EXCEEDED THIS TO ACHIEVE AND ENROLL A TOTAL NUMBER OF 185 STUDY PARTICIPANTS ACROSS ALL GROUPS FOR THE MAIN STUDY. THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC HAS RESULTED IN A REQUEST FOR A SOMEWHAT ALTERED CLASSIFICATION AND ENROLLMENT TARGET OF CLINICAL GROUPS, WHICH WAS APPROVED BY THE NIH IN 2021. THE SU HHC STUDY NOW CONSISTS OF GROUPS STRATIFIED NOT ONLY BY IGRA RESULTS OR PET/CT READOUT, BUT ALSO BY SARS-COV-2 SEROLOGY STATUS. THE BUDGET FOR PERIOD 6 WILL INCLUDE LIMITED PARTICIPANT RECRUITMENT AND BRONCHOSCOPIES, AS ORIGINALLY PROPOSED, WHICH WILL INCLUDE ONLY STUDY PARTICIPANTS FROM SELECTED €œBIOLOGICALLY INTERESTING€Ͽ½ CLINICAL PHENOTYPES FOR FURTHER TARGETED FUNCTIONAL ANALYSES THROUGH GRANULOMA MODEL MANIPULATION. SU HAS BUDGETED FOR N=12 BRONCHOSCOPIES.
B. END-ASSAYS: IMMUNOPHENOTYPING EXPERIMENTS €€Œ ONE OF THE DELIVERABLES AT SU IS TO CONDUCT DEEP PHENOTYPING OF PAIRED BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) AND PBMC FROM THE VARIOUS CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY CLINICAL GROUPS. SU HAS EVALUATED THE ASSAY PRIORITY LIST, AS WELL AS THE BAL AND PBMC SAMPLES COLLECTED FROM PARTICIPANTS ENROLLED IN THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, TO ENUMERATE THE NUMBER OF STORED SAMPLES AVAILABLE FOR THE OBJECTIVES RELATED TO THE PROPOSED PLANS FOR THIS END-ASSAY. OF ALL MAIN STUDY PARTICIPANTS FROM WHICH PAIRED BAL AND PBMC HAVE BEEN COLLECTED (N=190), SUFFICIENT CELL NUMBERS WERE OBTAINED FROM 88% OF PARTICIPANTS, WHICH INCLUDES MAKING USE OF RESIDUALLY STORED BAL CELLS. THIS ALSO INCLUDES REPLACEMENT OR REPEATING OF BRONCHOSCOPIES FOR N=5 OF THE PARTICIPANTS WITH LOW CELL YIELDS. WHILE THE BAL CELL AUTOFLUORESCENCE IS LIKELY TO RESULT IN A SMALLER NUMBER OF AVAILABLE FLUORESCENT CHANNELS FOR OUR BAL MYELOID FLOW CYTOMETRY IMMUNE PHENOTYPING PANEL, THE OPTIMIZATION OF THE 24 MARKER MYELOID PANEL FOR PBMC HAS BEEN COMPLETED WHILE OPTIMIZATION OF THE 27 MARKER LYMPHOID PANEL FOR PBMC WILL BE FINALIZED IN OCTOBER 2024. SU EXPECTS TO COMPLETE IMMUNE PHENOTYPING OF ALL SU HHC PBMC SAMPLES BY JUNE 2025. IMMUNE PHENOTYPING OF ALL SU HHC BAL SAMPLES USING THE LYMPHOID FLOW CYTOMETRY PANEL WILL BE COMPLETED BY DECEMBER 2025.
GRANULOMA MODEL/KILLING ASSAYS €€Œ SU WILL MAKE USE OF THE IN VITRO GRANULOMA MODEL ALONG WITH PARALLEL ASSESSMENTS IN MONOLAYER CULTURE AND UNFRACTIONATED PBMC AND BAL, TO ASSESS MTB KILLING AMONGST THE VARIOUS CLINICAL GROUPS. INTERESTING FINDINGS RELATED TO MTB CONTROL WILL BE TESTED IN FUTURE IN GRANULOMA MODEL EXPERIMENTS. BY USING CLINICAL SAMPLES FROM PARTICIPANTS NOT ELIGIBLE ACCORDING TO THE CASCADE HHC STUDY CRITERIA, SU HAS OPTIMIZED THE MODEL AND ALSO IMPLEMENTED CHANGES TO STREAMLINE BACTERIAL LOAD ASSESSMENT THROUGH MGIT CULTURE. SU EXPECTS TO COMPLETE THE KILLING ASSAY EXPERIMENTS FOR AT LEAST A QUARTER OF ALL SU HHC SAMPLES BY THE END OF PERIOD 6. THE RESULTS FROM VARIOUS CASCADE OMICS READOUTS (HUMAN AND LAB ANIMAL RESULTS) WILL INFORM 13488SUB Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: WA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $603,912 | Jan 20, 2025 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | AS PART OF THE HARVARD IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS (IMPACTB) CENTER, THE LABORATORY OF GERHARD WALZL WILL LEAD AND PERFORM WORK UNDER THE PROGRAM€„¢S OUTCOMES OF ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE PROJECT.
SPECIFICALLY, DR. WALZL WILL:
€¢ TRANSFER PLASMA AND BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) FLUID SAMPLES, COLLECTED FROM INDIVIDUALS PARTICIPATING IN AN ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY UNDERGOING PET-CT SCANS, TO THE ALTER LAB FOR SYSTEMS SEROLOGICAL ANALYSES.
€¢ CONDUCT BRONCHOSCOPIES AND SHARE WITH THE HARVARD TEAM, RESIDUAL BAL CELLS (FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY) AND PAIRED PERIPHERAL BLOOD MONONUCLEAR CELLS (FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY AND PCR POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY), UNDERGOING PETCT SCANS.
€¢ WORK CLOSELY WITH THE FLYNN LAB TO ARMONIZE PET-CT DEFINITIONS AND DATA.
€¢ COLLABORATE CLOSELY WITH THE SHALEK AND LAUFFENBURGER LABS ON SINGLE CELL COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSES.
€¢ MEET THE DELIVERABLES SET FORTH IN THE IMPACTB STATEMENT OF WORK, AS LISTED
BELOW. 109786-5120890 Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: MA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $309,087 | Mar 25, 2024 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | THE WALZL LABORATORY AT STELLENBOSCH UNIVERSITY (SU) WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CLINICAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL WORK (INCLUDING ON SITE DATA MANAGEMENT) OF THE PROJECT. SU WILL COORDINATE SAMPLE SHARING FROM EXISTING SAMPLE COLLECTIONS SUCH AS THE GC6 STUDY COLLECTION. SU WILL PROVIDE INPUT IN STUDY DESIGN OF IMMUNOLOGICAL STUDIES AND PARTICIPATE IN THE LEADERSHIP TEAM OF €œCASCADE IMPAC-TB€Ͽ½ CENTER, AND WILL ALSO PERFORM SOME OF THE BRONCHOSCOPIES. SU WILL INTERACT AND COORDINATE ALL PROJECT ACTIVITIES WITH THE PI OF THE PROJECT. TOGETHER WITH DR. DU PLESSIS, THE SU CO-PI, DR. WALZL, WILL REVIEW ALL RAW DATA GENERATED BY THE SU TEAM, AND SUPERVISE THE LABORATORY WORK, AND THE RESEARCH TECHNICIAN. SPECIFIC DELIVERABLES FOR YEAR 4 OF THE CONTRACT AT SU INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:
A. RECRUITMENT
MAIN STUDY: THE ORIGINAL RECRUITMENT GOALS WERE 50 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR PERIOD 1, 51 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR PERIOD 2, 57 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR PERIOD 3, 23 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR PERIOD 4, 18 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR PERIOD 5, 17 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR PERIOD 6 AND 20 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR PERIOD 7, TO MEET THE TOTAL OF 236 STUDY PARTICIPANTS FOR THE MAIN CONTRACT. DUE TO COVID-19, THE START OF RECRUITMENT WAS DELAYED BY ABOUT EIGHT MONTHS AND THE PACE OF RECRUITMENT HAS BEEN SLOW DUE TO MULTIPLE COVID-19 RELATED RESTRICTIONS AND CHALLENGES. TO ACCOUNT FOR THIS, WE NOW ARE INCLUDING AN ADDITIONAL N=30 STUDY PARTICIPANTS WHO ARE COVID-19 POSITIVE INTO THE MAIN CONTRACT, BRINGING THE TOTAL STUDY PARTICIPANTS TO N=266 FOR THE MAIN STUDY. THE NATIONAL STATE OF DISASTER, DUE TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC, WAS LIFTED ON APRIL 5, 2022, IN SOUTH AFRICA AND, AS OF JUNE 23, 2022, RESTRICTIONS THAT LIMITED THE CAPACITY WERE LIFTED. SU NO LONGER HAS TO LIMIT THE STAFF ON SITE. RESUMING CASCADE ACTIVITIES HAS THEREFORE INCREASED. FOR THE CASCADE MAIN STUDY, WE HAVE COMPLETED THE PERIOD 1 AND PERIOD 2 RECRUITMENT GOAL OF 101 PARTICIPANTS ALONG WITH THE PROCESSING OF BIOLOGICAL SPECIMENS COLLECTED FROM THESE PARTICIPANTS. WE MANAGED TO ENROLL 62 OF THE PERIOD 3 RECRUITMENT GOAL (AND PROCESSING OF SAMPLES). AT PRESENT WE HAVE PERFORMED BRONCHOSCOPIES ON 105 STUDY PARTICIPANTS, BUT EXPECT FURTHER CHALLENGES IN ACHIEVING THE PERIOD 4 AND 5 TARGETS BY THE INTENDED DEADLINES, DUE TO THE DIFFICULTY IN IDENTIFYING THE €œCONVERTER€Ͽ½, €œREVERTER€Ͽ½ AND €œIGRA NEGATIVE COMMUNITY CONTROL PARTICIPANTS€Ͽ½. STRATEGIES TO ENROLL PARTICIPANTS FROM THESE RARE GROUPS, ARE ONGOING. WE DID MANAGE TO ENROLL10 ADDITIONAL COVID-19-POSITIVE €œACTIVE TB PATIENTS€Ͽ½, 11 ADDITIONAL COVID-19-POSITIVE €œIGRA-POSITIVE COMMUNITY CONTROLS€Ͽ½ AND 14 ADDITIONAL €œADAPTIVE IMMUNE CONTROL HHC€Ͽ½. THIS BRINGS THE TOTAL CUMULATIVE ENROLLMENT TO N=163 STUDY PARTICIPANTS BY SEP 5, 2023 FOR THE MAIN CONTRACT. DURING PERIOD 5 WE WILL FOCUS ON REACHING THE RECRUITMENT TARGET FOR THE RARE GROUPS AND ALSO COMPLETING THE ADDITIONAL COVID-19-POSITIVE PARTICIPANTS ON THE MAIN STUDY. SU EXPECTS TO MEET THE RECRUITMENT GOAL OF 181 STUDY PARTICIPANTS BY SEPTEMBER 29, 2024, AND TO COMPLETE THE RECRUITMENT OF PERIOD 4 STUDY PARTICIPANTS.
B. END-ASSAYS
IMMUNEPHENTYPING (CYTOF) EXPERIMENTS (MAIN STUDY): A GOAL OF THE MAIN PROJECT IS TO CONDUCT DEEP PHENOTYPING OF PAIRED BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) AND PBMC FROM THE VARIOUS CLINICAL GROUPS. SU HAS EVALUATED THE ASSAY PRIORITY LIST, AS WELL AS THE BAL AND PBMC SAMPLES COLLECTED FROM PARTICIPANTS ENROLLED IN THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, TO ENUMERATE THE NUMBER OF STORED SAMPLES AVAILABLE FOR THE OBJECTIVES RELATED TO THE PROPOSED FOR THIS END-ASSAY. THUS FAR (AS OF SEP 5, 2023), OF THE MAIN STUDY PARTICIPANTS FROM WHICH PAIRED BAL AND PBMC HAVE BEEN COLLECTED (N=200), A TOTAL OF 45 PARTICIPANTS DID NOT YIELD SUFFICIENT BAL CELLS FOR CYTOF ANALYSIS. AS OF SEP 5 2023, SU MANAGED TO REPLACE OR REPEAT THE BRONCHOSCOPY FOR N=25 OF THE PARTICIPANTS WITH LOW CELL YIELDS. RECRUITMENT IS STILL ONGO 13208SUB Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: WA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $570,036 | Dec 31, 2023 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | THE WALZL LABORATORY AT STELLENBOSCH UNIVERSITY (SU) WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR OVERSEEING THE CLINICAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL WORK (INCLUDING ON SITE DATA MANAGEMENT) OF THE PROJECT. SU WILL PROVIDE INPUT ON THE DESIGN OF IMMUNOLOGICAL STUDIES AND PARTICIPATE IN THE LEADERSHIP TEAM OF THE €œCASCADE IMPAC-TB€Ͽ½ CENTER. SU WILL ALSO PERFORM SOME OF THE BRONCHOSCOPIES. SU WILL INTERACT AND COORDINATE ALL PROJECT ACTIVITIES WITH THE PI OF THE PROJECT. TOGETHER WITH DR. DU PLESSIS, THE SU CO-PI, DR. WALZL WILL REVIEW ALL RAW DATA GENERATED BY THE SU TEAM, AS WELL AS SUPERVISE THE LABORATORY WORK AND THE RESEARCH TECHNICIANS.
SPECIFIC DELIVERABLES FOR YEAR 4 OF THE WORK TO BE COMPLETED UNDER THE NEW 2022 SUPPLEMENT AT SU:
A. RECRUITMENT: SU HAS ENCOUNTERED A HIGH RATE OF PARTICIPANT EXCLUSION. CURRENTLY, APPROXIMATELY 50% OF PARTICIPANTS ARE EXCLUDED FROM THE STUDY FOR VARIOUS REASONS INCLUDING COMORBIDITIES OR QFT €ˌGREY ZONE€„¢ RESULTS. AS A RESULT, ADDITIONAL PARTICIPANTS MUST BE SCREENED TO MEET THE RECRUITMENT TARGETS. SU PREDICTS THAT 400 PARTICIPANTS WOULD NEED TO BE SCREENED TO RECRUIT THE REMAINING PARTICIPANTS.
FURTHER, IN LIGHT OF THE HIGH PREVALENCE OF COVID-19 IN SOUTH AFRICA SINCE THE INITIATION OF THESE STUDIES IN 2020, THE STUDY DESIGN HAS BEEN MODIFIED TO INCLUDE 30 ADDITIONAL SARS-COV-2 SEROLOGY-POSITIVE PARTICIPANTS INTO THREE ARMS OF THE STUDY (10 PARTICIPANTS EACH):
€¢ ACTIVE TB (GROUP 1),
€¢ HEALTHY COMMUNITY CONTROLS (GROUP 3)
€¢ HHC ADAPTIVE CONTROL (GROUP 7).
SU EXPECTS TO RECRUIT 10 OF THESE IN YEAR 4 IN ADDITION TO THE RECRUITMENT CARRIED OUT AS PART OF THE MAIN STUDY (SEPARATE SOW).
B. CHECKING OF DATA AND PREPARATION OF DATA FOR TRANSPORT TO IMMPORT DATABASE FOR DATA SHARING
€¢ SU WILL CARRY OUT QC ON THE CLINICAL DATA ENTERED INTO THE REDCAP STUDY DATABASE.
€¢ SU WILL ALSO PREPARE THE CLINICAL DATA, SAMPLE PROCESSING DATA AND EXPERIMENTAL DATA FOR SUBMISSION TO IMMPORT.
BOTH OF THESE STEPS REQUIRE EXTRA PERSONNEL WITH EXPERTISE IN HANDLING THESE DATA. DRS. TROMP AND MAASDORP WILL SUPERVISE THIS WORK.
C. BSL3 EQUIPMENT AND SAMPLE STORAGE
€¢ SU WILL STORE CASCADE SAMPLES IN THE NEWLY ACQUIRED BIOS BIOREPOSITORY, WHICH REQUIRES AN ANNUAL STORAGE FEE.
€¢ SU WILL SET UP A NEW BSL3 FACILITY FOR PROCESSING CASCADE SAMPLES IN OCTOBER 2022. THIS REQUIRES PURCHASE OF NEW EQUIPMENT: MICROSCOPE, TABLE-TOP CENTRIFUGE, CO2 INCUBATOR, LAPTOP COMPUTER FOR RECORDING SPECIMEN PROCESSING DATA 12936SUB Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: WA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $1,448,731 | Mar 31, 2023 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | THE WALZL LABORATORY AT STELLENBOSCH UNIVERSITY (SU) WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CLINICAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL WORK (INCLUDING ON SITE DATA MANAGEMENT) OF THE PROJECT. SU WILL COORDINATE SAMPLE SHARING FROM EXISTING SAMPLE COLLECTIONS SUCH AS THE GC6 STUDY COLLECTION. SU WILL PROVIDE INPUT IN STUDY DESIGN OF IMMUNOLOGICAL STUDIES AND PARTICIPATE IN THE LEADERSHIP TEAM OF €œCASCADE IMPAC-TB€Ͽ½ CENTER, AND WILL ALSO PERFORM SOME OF THE BRONCHOSCOPIES. SU WILL INTERACT AND COORDINATE ALL PROJECT ACTIVITIES WITH THE PI OF THE PROJECT. TOGETHER WITH DR. DU PLESSIS, THE SU CO-PI, DR. WALZL, WILL REVIEW ALL RAW DATA GENERATED BY THE SU TEAM, AND SUPERVISE THE LABORATORY WORK, AND THE RESEARCH TECHNICIAN. SPECIFIC DELIVERABLES FOR YEAR 4 OF THE CONTRACT AT SU INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:
A. RECRUITMENT
MAIN STUDY: THE ORIGINAL GOAL WAS 50 FOR PERIOD 1, 51 FOR PERIOD 2 AND FOR 57 FOR PERIOD 3 57 STUDY PARTICIPANTS. DUE TO COVID-19, THE START OF RECRUITMENT WAS DELAYED BY ABOUT EIGHT MONTHS AND THE PACE OF RECRUITMENT HAS BEEN SLOW DUE TO MULTIPLE COVID-19 RELATED RESTRICTIONS AND CHALLENGES. THE NATIONAL STATE OF DISASTER, DUE TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC, WAS LIFTED ON APRIL 5, 2022, IN SOUTH AFRICA AND, AS OF JUNE 23, 2022, RESTRICTIONS THAT LIMITED THE CAPACITY WERE LIFTED. SU NO LONGER HAS TO LIMIT THE STAFF ON SITE. RESUMING CASCADE ACTIVITIES HAS THEREFORE INCREASED. SU EXPECTS TO MEET THE COMBINED GOAL OF 101 STUDY PARTICIPANTS SET FOR PERIODS 1 AND 2 BY SEPTEMBER 29, 2022. SU EXPECTS TO MEET THE PERIOD 3 ORIGINAL RECRUITMENT GOAL OF 57 ADDITIONAL PARTICIPANTS BY SEPTEMBER 29, 2023, AND TO COMPLETE THE RECRUITMENT OF PERIOD 4 STUDY PARTICIPANTS (N=23; TOTAL OF 181 STUDY PARTICIPANTS IN P1-P4).
B. END-ASSAYS
CYTOF EXPERIMENTS (MAIN STUDY): A GOAL OF THE MAIN PROJECT IS TO CONDUCT DEEP PHENOTYPING OF PAIRED BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) AND PBMC FROM THE VARIOUS CLINICAL GROUPS. SU HAS EVALUATED THE ASSAY PRIORITY LIST, AS WELL AS THE BAL AND PBMC SAMPLES COLLECTED FROM PARTICIPANTS ENROLLED IN THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, TO ENUMERATE THE NUMBER OF STORED SAMPLES AVAILABLE FOR THE OBJECTIVES RELATED TO THE PROPOSED CYTOF END-ASSAY. THUS FAR (AS OF AUGUST 30, 2022), OF THE MAIN STUDY PARTICIPANTS FROM WHICH BAL AND PBMC HAVE BEEN COLLECTED (N=100), A TOTAL OF 23 PARTICIPANTS DID NOT YIELD SUFFICIENT BAL CELLS FOR CYTOF ANALYSIS. SU INTENDS TO REPLACE THE PARTICIPANTS WITH LOW CELL YIELDS, WITH NEW PARTICIPANTS FROM THE CORRESPONDING CLINICAL GROUPS, OR REPEAT THE BRONCHOSCOPIES ON THE ALREADY ENROLLED PARTICIPANTS. ALL PARTICIPANT SAMPLES YIELDED SUFFICIENT NUMBERS OF PBMCS FOR THE CYTOF ASSAY.
GRANULOMA MODEL (MAIN STUDY): SU WILL USE OUR GRANULOMA MODEL TO TEST HYPOTHESES GENERATED BY VARIOUS CASCADE RESEARCH GROUPS AND PLATFORMS. USING NON-CASCADE CLINICAL SAMPLES, SU HAS OPTIMIZED THE MODEL AND ALSO IMPLEMENTED CHANGES TO ASSEMBLE GRANULOMAS USING ONLY PBMC IN INSTANCES WHERE BAL SAMPLES MIGHT NOT BE AVAILABLE.
C. OTHER LABORATORY WORK
CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT OF BAL CELL YIELDS HAS REVEALED THAT BAL SAMPLES WITH EXTREME PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, DISPLAY EXCELLENT VIABILITIES PRIOR TO CRYOPRESERVATION, BUT UPON THAWING, SHOW A HETEROGENOUS VIABILITY PATTERN. EXTENSIVE INVESTIGATIONS REVEALED THAT THE LARGE, GIANT MACROPHAGES, WITH HEAVY PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, ARE MORE LIKELY TO SHOW POOR VIABILITY. THESE GIANT MACROPHAGES APPEARED TO EXCEED A SIZE OF 40 μM, WHICH LED TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF A 40 μM CELL STRAINING STEP, TO IMPROVE VIABILITY OF BAL CELLS UPON THAWING. THIS PREVENTATIVE MEASURE WILL BE ROUTINELY MONITORED AS RESIDUAL CELLS BECOME AVAILABLE TO THAW FOR VIABILITY TESTING. SU WILL CONTINUE LABORATORY INVESTIGATIONS TO INFORM THE DECISION OF REPLACING BAL CELL PHENOTYPING USING CYTOF INSTRUMENT, WITH THE SPECTRAL CYTOMETER (AURORA) PLATFORM. SU HAS USED SIX (NON-CASCADE) BAL SAMPLES TO OPTIMIZE THE ANTIBODIES FOR A SPECTRAL CYTOMETER, AND USED ONE BAL SAMPLE (NON-CASCADE) WITH EXTREME PARTICULATE M 12927SUB Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: WA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $525,719 | Mar 31, 2023 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | AS PART OF THE HARVARD IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM
TUBERCULOSIS (IMPACTB) CENTER, THE LABORATORY OF GERHARD WALZL WILL LEAD AND PERFORM WORK UNDER THE PROGRAM€„¢S OUTCOMES OF ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE PROJECT.
SPECIFICALLY, DR. WALZL WILL:
€¢ TRANSFER PLASMA AND BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) FLUID SAMPLES, COLLECTED FROM INDIVIDUALS PARTICIPATING IN AN ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY UNDERGOING PET-CT SCANS, TO THE ALTER LAB FOR SYSTEMS SEROLOGICAL ANALYSES.
€¢ CONDUCT BRONCHOSCOPIES AND SHARE WITH THE HARVARD TEAM, RESIDUAL BAL CELLS
(FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY) AND PAIRED PERIPHERAL BLOOD MONONUCLEAR CELLS (FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY AND PCR POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY), UNDERGOING PETCT SCANS.
€¢ WORK CLOSELY WITH THE FLYNN LAB TO ARMONIZE PET-CT DEFINITIONS AND DATA.
€¢ COLLABORATE CLOSELY WITH THE SHALEK AND LAUFFENBURGER LABS ON SINGLE CELL
COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSES.
€¢ MEET THE DELIVERABLES SET FORTH IN THE IMPACTB STATEMENT OF WORK, AS LISTED
BELOW. 109786.5120890 Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: MA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $354,435 | Mar 29, 2023 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | DR. WALZL WILL SERVE AS THE PI OF THE SUBCONTRACT TO SU AND WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR OVERSEEING THE CLINICAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL WORK (INCLUDING ON SITE DATA MANAGEMENT) OF THE PROJECT. HE WILL ALSO COORDINATE SAMPLE SHARING FROM EXISTING SAMPLE COLLECTIONS SUCH AS THE GC6 STUDY COLLECTION. HE WILL PROVIDE INPUT IN STUDY DESIGN OF IMMUNOLOGICAL STUDIES AND PARTICIPATE IN THE LEADERSHIP TEAM OF €œCASCADE IMPAC-TB€Ͽ½ CENTER. HE WILL ALSO PERFORM SOME OF THE BRONCHOSCOPIES. DR. WALZL WILL INTERACT AND COORDINATE ALL PROJECT ACTIVITIES WITH THE PI OF THE PROJECT. TOGETHER WITH DR. DU PLESSIS, THE SU CO-PI, HE WILL REVIEW ALL RAW DATA GENERATED BY THE SU TEAM. HE WILL ALSO SUPERVISE THE LABORATORY WORK, AND THE RESEARCH TECHNICIAN.
SPECIFIC DELIVERABLES FOR YEAR 3 OF THE CONTRACT AT SU:
A. RECRUITMENT
MAIN STUDY: THE ORIGINAL GOAL FOR PERIOD 1 WAS 50 STUDY PARTICIPANTS AND FOR PERIOD 2 51 PARTICIPANTS. DUE TO COVID-19, THE START OF RECRUITMENT WAS DELAYED BY ABOUT 8 MONTHS AND THE PACE OF RECRUITMENT HAS BEEN SLOW DUE TO MULTIPLE COVID-19 RELATED RESTRICTIONS AND CHALLENGES. WE HAVE COMPLETED PERIOD 1 RECRUITMENT AND EXPECT TO COMPLETE THE PERIOD 2 RECRUITMENT GOAL OF 51 PARTICIPANTS BY SEPTEMBER 29, 2022.
COVID-19 SUPPLEMENT: WE EXPECT TO RECRUIT THE REQUIRED 80 COV-POSITIVE PARTICIPANTS NEEDED FOR THE WORK BY SEPTEMBER 29, 2023.
B. CYTOF EXPERIMENTS
WE HAVE EVALUATED THE ASSAY/SAMPLE PRIORITY LIST AS WELL AS THE BAL AND PBMC SAMPLES COLLECTED FROM PARTICIPANTS ENROLLED ON THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, TO ENUMERATE THE NUMBER OF STORED SAMPLES AVAILABLE FOR THE OBJECTIVES RELATED TO THE PROPOSED CYTOF END ASSAY. THUS FAR (AS OF NOV 9, 2021), OF ALL THE MAIN STUDY PARTICIPANT SAMPLES FROM WHICH BAL AND PBMC HAVE BEEN COLLECTED (N=66), A TOTAL OF 22 PARTICIPANTS DID NOT YIELD SUFFICIENT BAL CELLS FOR CYTOF ANALYSIS. THERE ARE ONGOING DISCUSSIONS WITH THE CLINICAL TEAM REGARDING THE POSSIBLE REPLACEMENT OF THESE PARTICIPANTS WITH LOW CELL YIELDS, WITH NEW PARTICIPANTS FROM THE CORRESPONDING CLINICAL GROUPS. ALL PARTICIPANT SAMPLES YIELDED SUFFICIENT NUMBERS OF PBMCS FOR THE CYTOF ASSAY.
C. OTHER LABORATORY WORK
CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT OF BAL CELL YIELDS HAS REVEALED THAT BAL SAMPLES WITH EXTREME PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, DISPLAY EXCELLENT VIABILITIES PRIOR TO CRYOPRESERVATION, BUT UPON THAWING, SHOW A HETEROGENOUS VIABILITY PATTERN. EXTENSIVE INVESTIGATIONS REVEALED THAT THE LARGE, GIANT MACROPHAGES, WITH HEAVY PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, ARE MORE LIKELY TO SHOW POOR VIABILITY. THESE GIANT MACROPHAGES APPEARED TO EXCEED A SIZE OF 40 μM, WHICH LED TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF A 40 μM CELL STRAINING STEP, TO IMPROVE VIABILITY OF BAL CELLS UPON THAWING. THIS PREVENTATIVE MEASURE WILL BE ROUTINELY MONITORED AS RESIDUAL CELLS BECOME AVAILABLE TO THAW FOR VIABILITY TESTING. WE WILL CONTINUE OUR LABORATORY INVESTIGATIONS TO INFORM THE DECISION OF REPLACING BAL CELL PHENOTYPING USING CYTOF INSTRUMENT, WITH THE SPECTRAL CYTOMETER (AURORA) PLATFORM. WE HAVE ALREADY USED ONE BAL SAMPLE WITH EXTREME PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, AND THEREFORE MAXIMAL AUTOFLUORESCENT SIGNAL, AND IN PARALLEL COMPARED ITS PERFORMANCE ON THE SPECTRAL CYTOMETER TO THAT OF THE CYTOF INSTRUMENT, USING THE CORE PANEL OF CYTOF ANTIBODIES ACROSS THESE TWO INSTRUMENTS. 12706SUB Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: WA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $775,667 | Dec 31, 2022 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | AS PART OF THE HARVARD IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM
TUBERCULOSIS (IMPACTB) CENTER, THE LABORATORY OF GERHARD WALZL WILL LEAD AND PERFORM WORK UNDER THE PROGRAM€„¢S OUTCOMES OF ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE PROJECT.
SPECIFICALLY, DR. WALZL WILL:
€¢ TRANSFER PLASMA AND BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) FLUID SAMPLES, COLLECTED FROM INDIVIDUALS PARTICIPATING IN AN ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY UNDERGOING PET-CT SCANS, TO THE ALTER LAB FOR SYSTEMS SEROLOGICAL ANALYSES.
€¢ CONDUCT BRONCHOSCOPIES AND SHARE WITH THE HARVARD TEAM, RESIDUAL BAL CELLS (FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY) AND PAIRED PERIPHERAL BLOOD MONONUCLEAR CELLS (FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY AND PCR POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY), UNDERGOING PETCT SCANS.
€¢ WORK CLOSELY WITH THE FLYNN LAB TO ARMONIZE PET-CT DEFINITIONS AND DATA.
€¢ COLLABORATE CLOSELY WITH THE SHALEK AND LAUFFENBURGER LABS ON SINGLE CELL COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSES.
€¢ MEET THE DELIVERABLES SET FORTH IN THE IMPACTB STATEMENT OF WORK, AS LISTED BELOW. 109786.5120890 Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: MA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $114,275 | Jun 14, 2022 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | DR. WALZL WILL SERVE AS THE PI OF THE SUBCONTRACT TO SU AND WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR OVERSEEING THE CLINICAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL WORK (INCLUDING ON SITE DATA MANAGEMENT) OF THE PROJECT. HE WILL ALSO COORDINATE SAMPLE SHARING FROM EXISTING SAMPLE COLLECTIONS SUCH AS THE GC6 STUDY COLLECTION. HE WILL PROVIDE INPUT IN STUDY DESIGN OF IMMUNOLOGICAL STUDIES AND PARTICIPATE IN THE LEADERSHIP TEAM OF €œCASCADE IMPAC-TB€Ͽ½ CENTER. HE WILL ALSO PERFORM SOME OF THE BRONCHOSCOPIES. DR. WALZL WILL INTERACT AND COORDINATE ALL PROJECT ACTIVITIES WITH THE PI OF THE PROJECT. TOGETHER WITH DR. DU PLESSIS, THE SU CO-PI, HE WILL REVIEW ALL RAW DATA GENERATED BY THE SU TEAM. HE WILL ALSO SUPERVISE THE LABORATORY WORK, AND THE RESEARCH TECHNICIAN.
SPECIFIC DELIVERABLES FOR YEAR 3 OF THE CONTRACT AT SU:
A. RECRUITMENT
MAIN STUDY: THE ORIGINAL GOAL FOR PERIOD 1 WAS 50 STUDY PARTICIPANTS AND FOR PERIOD 2 51 PARTICIPANTS. DUE TO COVID-19, THE START OF RECRUITMENT WAS DELAYED BY ABOUT 8 MONTHS AND THE PACE OF RECRUITMENT HAS BEEN SLOW DUE TO MULTIPLE COVID-19 RELATED RESTRICTIONS AND CHALLENGES. WE HAVE COMPLETED PERIOD 1 RECRUITMENT AND EXPECT TO COMPLETE THE PERIOD 2 RECRUITMENT GOAL OF 51 PARTICIPANTS BY SEPTEMBER 29, 2022.
COVID-19 SUPPLEMENT: WE EXPECT TO RECRUIT THE REQUIRED 80 COV-POSITIVE PARTICIPANTS NEEDED FOR THE WORK BY SEPTEMBER 29, 2023.
B. CYTOF EXPERIMENTS
WE HAVE EVALUATED THE ASSAY/SAMPLE PRIORITY LIST AS WELL AS THE BAL AND PBMC SAMPLES COLLECTED FROM PARTICIPANTS ENROLLED ON THE CASCADE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY, TO ENUMERATE THE NUMBER OF STORED SAMPLES AVAILABLE FOR THE OBJECTIVES RELATED TO THE PROPOSED CYTOF END ASSAY. THUS FAR (AS OF NOV 9, 2021), OF ALL THE MAIN STUDY PARTICIPANT SAMPLES FROM WHICH BAL AND PBMC HAVE BEEN COLLECTED (N=66), A TOTAL OF 22 PARTICIPANTS DID NOT YIELD SUFFICIENT BAL CELLS FOR CYTOF ANALYSIS. THERE ARE ONGOING DISCUSSIONS WITH THE CLINICAL TEAM REGARDING THE POSSIBLE REPLACEMENT OF THESE PARTICIPANTS WITH LOW CELL YIELDS, WITH NEW PARTICIPANTS FROM THE CORRESPONDING CLINICAL GROUPS. ALL PARTICIPANT SAMPLES YIELDED SUFFICIENT NUMBERS OF PBMCS FOR THE CYTOF ASSAY.
C. OTHER LABORATORY WORK
CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT OF BAL CELL YIELDS HAS REVEALED THAT BAL SAMPLES WITH EXTREME PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, DISPLAY EXCELLENT VIABILITIES PRIOR TO CRYOPRESERVATION, BUT UPON THAWING, SHOW A HETEROGENOUS VIABILITY PATTERN. EXTENSIVE INVESTIGATIONS REVEALED THAT THE LARGE, GIANT MACROPHAGES, WITH HEAVY PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, ARE MORE LIKELY TO SHOW POOR VIABILITY. THESE GIANT MACROPHAGES APPEARED TO EXCEED A SIZE OF 40 μM, WHICH LED TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF A 40 μM CELL STRAINING STEP, TO IMPROVE VIABILITY OF BAL CELLS UPON THAWING. THIS PREVENTATIVE MEASURE WILL BE ROUTINELY MONITORED AS RESIDUAL CELLS BECOME AVAILABLE TO THAW FOR VIABILITY TESTING. WE WILL CONTINUE OUR LABORATORY INVESTIGATIONS TO INFORM THE DECISION OF REPLACING BAL CELL PHENOTYPING USING CYTOF INSTRUMENT, WITH THE SPECTRAL CYTOMETER (AURORA) PLATFORM. WE HAVE ALREADY USED ONE BAL SAMPLE WITH EXTREME PARTICULATE MATTER LOADING, AND THEREFORE MAXIMAL AUTOFLUORESCENT SIGNAL, AND IN PARALLEL COMPARED ITS PERFORMANCE ON THE SPECTRAL CYTOMETER TO THAT OF THE CYTOF INSTRUMENT, USING THE CORE PANEL OF CYTOF ANTIBODIES ACROSS THESE TWO INSTRUMENTS.
€ƒ 12706SUB Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: WA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $711,990 | May 31, 2022 | — – — |
| Subcontractor | Department of Health and Human Services | AS PART OF THE HARVARD IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS (IMPACTB) CENTER, THE LABORATORY OF GERHARD WALZL WILL LEAD AND PERFORM WORK UNDER THE PROGRAM€„¢S OUTCOMES OF ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE PROJECT.
SPECIFICALLY, DR. WALZL WILL:
€¢ TRANSFER PLASMA AND BRONCHOALVEOLAR LAVAGE (BAL) FLUID SAMPLES, COLLECTED FROM INDIVIDUALS PARTICIPATING IN AN ACUTE MTB EXPOSURE HOUSEHOLD CONTACT STUDY UNDERGOING PET-CT SCANS, TO THE ALTER LAB FOR SYSTEMS SEROLOGICAL ANALYSES.
€¢ CONDUCT BRONCHOSCOPIES AND SHARE WITH THE HARVARD TEAM, RESIDUAL BAL CELLS (FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY) AND PAIRED PERIPHERAL BLOOD MONONUCLEAR CELLS (FROM COVID SEROLOGICALLY AND PCR POSITIVE HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS AND COMMUNITY CONTROLS ONLY), UNDERGOING PET-CT SCANS.
€¢ WORK CLOSELY WITH THE FLYNN LAB TO HARMONIZE PET-CT DEFINITIONS AND DATA.
€¢ COLLABORATE CLOSELY WITH THE SHALEK AND LAUFFENBURGER LABS ON SINGLE CELL COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSES.
€¢ MEET THE DELIVERABLES SET FORTH IN THE IMPACTB STATEMENT OF WORK, AS LISTED BELOW. 109786.5120890 Parent award context Parent award agency: Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health Parent award NAICS: 541714 Parent award performance state: MA Parent award description: IMMUNE MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS CENTER (IMPAC-TB) View parent award on USAspending | — | $67,638 | Oct 8, 2021 | — – — |
Contract vehicles are shown only when present in the source record. Linked award numbers and vehicles open the authoritative record on USAspending.gov.
Agencies supported
- Department of DefenseGov-sourced