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Louis Picker, vaccine expert at Oregon Health & Science University

(Oregon Health & Science University)

Human trials of a potential HIV vaccine could begin as soon as 2016 under a $25 million grant awarded to Oregon Health & Science University researcher Louis Picker.

The Gates Foundation funds, to be announced Wednesday, will support development of a vaccine that could prevent transmission of HIV, or lead to a cure for those already infected.

Picker's HIV-fighting efforts are among the most closely watched in the world on the strength of research last year showing his vaccine eradicated Simian Immunodeficiency Virus – a closely related cousin to HIV -- in half of primates infected.

Picker called it "quite likely" the human version of the vaccine will achieve similar results. "I think we have a very good shot at it."

If successful, making the vaccine commercially available probably couldn't be possible much before 2024, he said.

Several earlier hoped-for vaccines to battle HIV have failed. So Picker's work holds some of the greatest promise for a disease, AIDS, that killed 1.5 million people worldwide last year.

The Gates Foundation funding "is huge for us because it allows us sufficient money to do the necessary things we need to do to get this into humans," Picker said. "My hardest job is really to go out and get the money to do the work. Strange as it may seem that's sometimes harder than doing the science itself."

Last September, Picker and his colleagues published their groundbreaking paper in the prestigious journal Nature.

That study focused on only 16 primates, but the vaccine has shown similar results in nearly 100 test animals.

The vaccine "is probably one of the best tested HIV vaccine strategies in non-human primates and it's consistently shown the same efficacy," Picker said.

His technique modifies a common, typically harmless virus, called cytomegalovirus or CMV, to essentially retrain the body's immune system to target SIV.

As a result, the body's T-cells, the immune system's shock troops, are constantly patrolling for the virus, in seek-and-destroy mode.

"We fully expect ... this (technique) should do the same thing in humans," Picker said. "I think we have a very good shot at it."

Gates had already provided $8 million toward Picker's work. Past funding has also come from the National Institutes of Health, which labeled Picker's work some of the most promising of 2013.

Picker and his colleagues conducted their earlier work at the OHSU Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute, located on OHSU's Hillsboro campus with the Oregon National Primate Research Center.

Now they must apply to the federal government to approve their human testing plan, said Picker, who heads vaccine development at the institute.

Multiple rounds of testing will focus on safety and effectiveness of a prototype vaccine as well as an improved version.

Considering the reach of HIV, the vaccine could be administered to millions, Picker said Tuesday. "You have to make sure that it works and make sure that it's safe."

-- Nick Budnick