The Laboratory of B cell Immunotechnology is led by Tony Moody, MD.  Dr. Moody is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Division of Infectious Diseases at Duke University Medical Center.  He serves as the CHAVI Chief Medical Officer and oversees the CHAVI B cell Immune Monitoring Core.  He is the Principal Investigator of the CHAVI 005 study and the 008A study and his lab supports CHAVI 001 and 012 efforts as well.  Research in the Moody lab is focused on understanding the B cell responses during the earliest stages of HIV infection.  The lab has become a resource for human phenotyping, flow characterization, staining and analysis at DHVI.

 

The CHAVI B cell Immune Monitoring Core is studying changes to the B cell arm of the immune system during the earliest time points after HIV infection, as early as 17 days after transmission. This group recently elucidated the alterations to B cells that occur during acute/early HIV infection and have submitted a manuscript describing this work.  The Moody lab provides flow cytometry support to the Haynes/Liao group for work on the Antibodyome project.  This cytometric support includes the isolation and phenotyping of cell populations from tissues and blood obtained from CHAVI 012 and single cell sorting of antigen-specific B cells using new dual tetramer labeling technology that can potentially produce new HIV-1 specific monoclonal antibodies.  The lab continues to work on the development of new flow cytometric panels that can enhance the detection of B cell responses during the acute/early HIV infection.

 

The CHAVI 005 study is investigating the role of autoimmune disease in the ability to make broadly reactive antibodies against HIV.  The Moody lab recently elucidated the mechanism of anti-lipid antibody activity in certain HIV-1 neutralization assays and has submitted a manuscript describing this work.  The group continues to study CHAVI 005 samples looking for anti-cardiolipin antibodies and for the presence of lupus anticoagulant activity and for the potential of these samples to block HIV-1 infection in various assays.

Molecular Characterization of HIV-1 Neutralizing Antibody Breadth and Potency in Natural Infection (CHAVI 008A)

 

The CHAVI 008A study is designed to obtain clinical material from uninfected and HIV-1 infected patients for method development and pilot study work that is outside the scope of the other CHAVI protocols. The goal of this study is to provide a source of material to develop and optimize new assays and methods without depleting the rare and valuable clinical material obtained in CHAVI 001, 005, 012, and other CHAVI studies. The Moody lab currently processes all samples obtained through the 008A protocol.

 

The Moody lab also provides B cell tetramer reagents for DHVI groups and CHAVI collaborators as part of the Tetramer Conjugation Core.  They offer custom antibody conjugations for CHAVI pheonotyping work, DHVI work and for other collaborations at Duke.  The lab produces B cell tetramers listed in both PacificBlue and allophycocyanin conjugates, which allows for the simultaneous labeling of B cells and further isolation of the population of interest. The Moody lab has integrated these reagents into their full B cell panel allowing them to select for class-switched B cells so they can isolate memory B cells.