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“It's a perennial race between new infectious diseases arising and society reacting to them, understanding them and defeating them. ”
Alessandro Sette, Ph.D.
Head and Member
Center for Infectious Disease; Allergy & Asthma Research
Contact
biography

cell-bullet1.jpg“New infectious agents originate all the time dating back to the plague in the siege of Athens in the 7th Century to the endemic flu in 1918 that killed 20 million people. For medical science, it’s a perennial race between new infectious diseases coming up and society reacting to them, understanding them and ultimately defeating them.” – Alessandro Sette, Ph.D.

Alessandro Sette, Ph.D.Dr. Sette started at LIAI in 2002 as the Head of the Initiative for Emerging Diseases and Biodefense. In 2003 he became the Head of the Division of Translational Immunology. At LIAI, Dr. Sette's research focuses on the identification of epitopes, working to understand how vaccines should be constructed. The team's work is heavily focused on emerging disease threats or bioterror threats, such as SARS, arena viruses, smallpox and flu viruses. Dr. Sette's group is also leading an effort to bring a premier collaboration resource to the scientific community. The NIAID has awarded Dr. Sette a long-term contract to design and produce a national Immune Epitope Database (IEDB) to aide in the acceleration of vaccine-development on a global scale.

Dr. Sette received his degree in Biological Sciences from the University of Roma, Laboratory of Pathology in 1984. In 1984, Dr. Sette was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the same laboratory. From 1986-1988, he joined The National Jewish Center for Immunology and Respiratory Medicine in Denver, in the USA as a post-doctoral fellow.

In 2002, Dr. Sette was named Adjunct Professor in the Department of Experimental Medicine at the Scripps Research Institute, where he is also Scientific Director of the Rheumatic Diseases Core Center since 2004. In 2003 he was named Adjunct Professor in the department of Medicine at the University of California, San Diego.

Dr. Sette is a member of numerous grant review panels and a reviewer for many scientific publications. He is also a member of the editorial advisory board for Immunogenetics, Human Immunology, Current Pharmaceutical Biotechnology, Current Drugs, and Tissue Antigens.
research focus
cell-bullet2.jpgAlessandro Sette, Dr. Biol.Sc., and his laboratory study ways to fight diseases by understanding the immune response, measuring immune activity, and developing disease intervention strategies against a number of new and emerging infectious diseases. These include Influenza, arena viruses, a family of viruses responsible for hemorrhagic fever and meningitis, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) as well as diseases of renewed interest, such as smallpox, because of the growing threat of bioterrorism. The laboratory is defining in chemical terms what murine, non-human primate and human immune system recognizes and uses this knowledge to measure and understand anti-pathogen immune responses. This approach is helping unlock the mysteries of how the body successfully battles infection, and conversely, how pathogens escape the immune system, causing the individual to succumb to disease. From this data, Sette and his team believe their research will lead to development of new therapeutic and prophylactic approaches to fighting infectious diseases.

A major focus of the Sette's group is also the design and population of the Immune Epitope Database, developed under a NIAID contract. The database allows researchers around the world to quickly access key information on the way the body responds to disease-causing agents, especially those that are responsible for emerging infectious diseases, or that are part of potential bioterrorist threats. By allowing researchers to share and analyze data in this unprecedented manner, the database provides an important tool for accelerating the development and improvement of vaccines.
selected publications

cell-bullet3.jpgPolyfunctional CD4+ T cell responses to a set of pathogenic arenaviruses provide broad population coverage. Immunome Res. 2010

Identification of broad binding class I HLA supertype epitopes to provide universal coverage of influenza A virus. Hum Immunol. 2010  

Design and utilization of epitope-based databases and predictive tools. Immunogenetics. 2010 

Five HLA-DP molecules frequently expressed in the worldwide human population share a common HLA supertypic binding specificity. J Immunol. 2010 

The immune epitope database 2.0. Nucleic Acids Res. 2010 

Definition of epitopes and antigens recognized by vaccinia specific immune responses: their conservation in variola virus sequences, and use as a model system to study complex pathogens. Vaccine. 2009 

A multivalent and cross-protective vaccine strategy against arenaviruses associated with human disease. PLoS Path. 2009

Pre-existing immunity against swine-origin H1N1 influenza viruses in the general human population. Proc Nat Acad Sci USA. 2009 

Classification of the universe of immune epitope literature: representation and knowledge gaps. PLoS One. 2009 

Of mice and humans: how good are HLA transgenic mice as a model of human immune responses? Immunome Res. 2009 

Two MHC class I molecules associated with elite control of immunodeficiency virus replication, Mamu-B*08 and HLA-B*2705, bind peptides with sequence similarity. J Immunol. 2009 

A protective role for dengue virus-specific CD8+ T cells. J Immunol. 2009 

Correlates of protection efficacy induced by vaccinia virus-specific CD8(+) T-cell epitopes in the murine intranasal challenge model. Eur J Immunol. 2009

Meta-analysis of immune epitope data for all Plasmodia: overview and applications for malarial immunobiology and vaccine-related issues. Parasite Immunol. 2009

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The link above may include papers by scientists with the same or similar name.

staff list
upcoming seminars
  • Joel Ernst,  "The Immunological Life cycle of Tuberculosis",  Wednesday, 09/08/10: 12:00 PM
  • David Nemazee,  "Genetics and biochemical analysis of B cell tolerance",  Wednesday, 09/15/10: 12:00 PM
  • More Seminars
links
AWARDS AND HONORS
  • International Immunomics and Immmunogenics Society Award, 2006
  • Named Adjunct Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Diego, 2003
  • Named Adjunct Professor in the Department of Experimental Medicine at the Scripps Research Institute, 2002
  • ISI highly cited investigator (top 100 in the Immunology category over the 1981-2000. Period), with over 11,000 Citation Index citations, 2001
  • American Liver Foundation Award for Biotechnology Companies, 2000
  • Member of the Kriegler Lecture and Award Selection Committee, 1998
  • 51st Oregon State University Biological Colloquium Award, 1990
  • American Association of Immunologists Investigator Award, 1995
  • Member of A. Geluk Ph.D. thesis graduating committee, University of Leiden, The Netherlands, 2005

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