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Project
1: New Vectors for Gene Therapy of Hemophilia A and a-1
Antitrypsin Deficiency.
The overall goal of this proposal is to achieve long-term expression
of human factor VIII (FVIII) and human a1-antitrypsin
(hAAT) at therapeutic levels in mice. Towards this goal, we will
utilize hybrid DAd.AAV
vectors, which are devoid of all adenoviral genes and accommodate
transgene cassettes with a maximal size of 20kb. These vectors
integrate randomly into the host genome with a frequency comparable
to recombinant AAV vectors. Transient expression of AAV rep78
from non-integrating adenoviral vectors stimulates site-specific
integration of DAd.AAV
vectors. We will use two principal gene transfer approaches: (A)
transduction of hepatocytes in vivo after systemic vector
application and (B) in vitro transduction of bone marrow
derived stem cells with subsequent transplantation and liver repopulation.
In the in vivo transduction studies (A), we will test i)
whether the use of DAd.AAV
vectors retargeted to hepatocytes will minimize vector related
toxic and immunological side effects; ii) whether modified DAd.AAV
vectors in combination with transient rep78 expression will allow
for site-specific integration in hepatocytes; and iii) whether
integrated transgenes will provide sustained FVIII and hAAT expression
at therapeutic levels. In the
in vitro transduction studies with bone marrow derived
stem cells (B), we will test i) whether bone marrow cells
with liver repopulation capacity can be stably transduced with
retargeted DAd.AAV
vectors; ii) whether transduced cells will engraft in normal
or diseased mouse livers, differentiate into hepatocytes, and
provide lifelong transgene expression; and iii) whether
this approach will circumvent the production of neutralizing antibodies
to FVIII or hAAT. For both strategies, we will assess whether
transduced cells can be expanded in vivo by dimerizer-drug
dependent induction of cell proliferation. in vitro transduction
and integration studies will be performed with murine and human
hepatocytes. Vector toxicity tests and preliminary in vivo transduction
studies will be done in normal mice to select the optimal vector/s
and doses for subsequent studies in murine disease models including
hemophilic, FVIII knockout mice and hAAT transgenic mice.
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