The Univeristy of Melbourne The Royal Melbourne Hopspital

A joint venture between The University of Melbourne and The Royal Melbourne Hospital

  • Research Groups
    • Kent Group

      Stephen’s group studies immunity to HIV, influenza and SARS-CoV-2. They are analysing a variety of vaccine strategies, including nanoparticle-based vaccines. They are studying a series of immune responses to gain better insights into protective immunity to important viral pathogens. They are developing monoclonal antibody therapies for HIV, influenza and SARS-CoV-2 to improve the treatment of these infections. The Kent group works very closely with Dr Amy Chung’s laboratory at the Doherty Institute.

      Other work areas include:COVID-19, HIV, Influenza


    Current Projects

    • Antibody dependent cellular cytotoxicity (ADCC) - a neglected anti-HIV immune response!

      The importance of HIV-specific Antibody-dependent Cellular Cytotoxicity (ADCC) antibodies that inhibit viral replication mediated through the Fc receptor is becoming clear. In view of the difficulty of inducing broad neutralising antibodies and effective T cell immunity, exploring HIV-specific ADCC is a priority. HIV-specific ADCC has been under-explored both from the point of view of rapid, reliable assays to measure and characterise ADCC responses and the ability to specifically induce high level HIV-specific ADCC antibodies by vaccination. Recent data from the RV144 vaccine study in Thailand suggest a role for non-neutralising antibodies in protection from HIV.

    • Combined Influenza-AIDS Vaccines

      Influenza and HIV are both serious global pathogens. Can a single vaccine be designed to cover both viruses? Recent advances in reverse genetic techniques allow insertion of foreign antigens into live influenza viruses. Further, live attenuated influenza vaccines are now highly effective vaccines. Stephen’s group is designing recombinant influenza vaccines with inserted HIV antigens to test as a combined Influenza-AIDS vaccine. An advantage of this strategy is that as a mucosal virus, there is a strong likelihood that immunity at mucosal surfaces, where HIV is first encountered, can be induced with this approach. 

    • Nanoparticle HIV vaccines

      No safe HIV vaccines have been able to stimulate durable, activated T-cell immunity. Stephen’s group is investigating an exciting HIV vaccination approach using hollow, submicron, delivery vehicles (nanocapsules) as carriers for HIV vaccines. This is a novel, cross-disciplinary project within the Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence in Bio-Nano interactions. Nanocapsules are designed to induce optimal immune responses by protecting antigens from degradation prior to reaching sites of immune activation and activate antigen presenting cells in a way that will initiate anti-viral immune responses. Stephen’s group aims to use controlled-release nanocapsules to stimulate durable anti-HIV responses in vivo.

    • NKT cells, MAIT cells and HIV

      NKT cells are a small but very important lymphocyte population in blood that possess potent antiviral and antitumor activities. NKT cells are depleted during HIV infection. Stephen’s group are now devising strategies to enhance the biologic utility of NKT cells in fighting HIV. They are also starting to study an interesting population of cells called Mucosal-associated Invariant T cells (MAIT cells). MAIT cells are likely to be important in protecting HIV-infected people from damage at mucosal surfaces such as the gut.

    • Influenza – specific ADCC: role in a Universal Flu vaccine?

      Influenza mutates regularly to avoid neutralising antibodies. Immune responses targeting more conserved areas are needed to combat new flu pandemics. Stephen’s group have adapted and refined their HIV ADCC assays to study Influenza. They have found there is a remarkable degree of cross-reactivity in influenza ADCC immunity. They recently found that influenza ADCC can play a role in reducing the severity of the 2009 Swine Flu epidemic. The work opens up a whole new field of flu immunity. They are now studying how flu-specific ADCC can be induced by vaccination and lead to protective immunity.

    • Influenza immunity and novel vaccines

      Seasonal Influenza continues to extract a huge toll on the community and there is the ever-present threat of new pandemics. Led by Dr Adam Wheatley, we are making headway into improving our understanding of influenza immunity with a view to improving vaccines. Current vaccines are imperfect and often target variable regions of the virus which “drift” away from effective immunity each winter. We are focussing on improving immunity, both antibodies and CD4 T cell helper cells (“Tfh”) to conserved parts of influenza, including the stem of HA. We also have a major interest in improving ADCC antibodies against influenza. The group has had a major push to understand and improve immunity to Influenza type B viruses and we have now generated panels of monoclonal antibodies that target this virus. We have series of exciting projects studying nanoparticle vaccines where tiny capsules are loaded with vaccine antigens to protect them from degradation and target important immune cells that stimulate effective immunity.

    • Nanoparticle Vaccine Research

      The Kent group is part of an Australian Research Council funded Centre of Excellence on nanomedicine.  They have a series of work studying how small particles “nanoparticles” interact with the immune system and how this could be exploited in the future as vaccines or therapies. Tke Kent group have collaborated widely with many of the groups within their centre, including the Caruso group, the Crampin groupthe Davis group, the Pu-Chun Ke group, the Johnson group, the Whittaker groupthe Thurecht group, and the Thordarson and Kavallaris groups. They are hosting research in the Kent laboratory from Dr David Ju of the Caruso group and they are jointly supervising Mai Vu from the Davis/Truong group at Monash for her PhD. They are actively working on liposomal, mesoporous silica templated, and self-assembling ferritin nanoparticle vaccines for influenza, HIV and SARS-CoV2.

    • COVID-19 animals models

      The Kent group are working to improve the ability to measure anto-COVID-19 immunity in ferrets together with collaborators at CSIRO. They recently developed the capacity to clone out influenza-specific monoclonal antibodies from ferrets (Wong et al Plos One, 2020 in press). They have also recently developed better reagents to study Tfh, B cells and NK cells in ferrets – these should be useful reagents to better understand immunity to SARS-CoV2 infection in ferrets.

    • COVID-19 vaccines

      A group led by Dr Adam Wheatley, Dr Jennifer Juno and Hyon-Xhi Tan are making protoype vaccines against SARS-CoV2 based on their track record in InfluenzaHIV and with nanoparticles. They are comparing spike protein vs RBD protein immunisation with in-depth humoral, B cell and T cell studies in mice and larger animal models. They are developing self-assembling ferritin nanoparticle vaccines, analogous to recently published work in Influenza by Hannah Kelly and Dr Adam Wheatley. Dr Jennifer Juno is leading the work to improve antibody responses through induction of T-follicular helper responses, a critically important cell in the lymph node draining the site of vaccination.


    Lab Team

    Kent Group

    • Laboratory Head
    • Laboratory Head
    • Hyon-Xhi Tan
      Research Officer
    • Senior Research Fellow
    • Research Officer
    • Mai Ngoc Vu
      Postdoctoral Fellow
    • Lara Schwab
      Research Officer
    • Mitchell Zheng
      Postdoctoral Fellow
    • Rosela Webster
      Postdoctoral Fellow
    • Chris Gonelli
      Research Officer
    • Palak Mehta
      Research Officer
    • Thakshila Amarasena
      Research Support Officer
    • Andrew Kelly
      Research Assistant
    • Lauren Burmas
      Research Assistant
    • Julie Nguyen
      Research Assistant
    • Robyn Esterbauer
      Research Assistant
    • Ellie Reilly
      Research Assistant
    • Jane Batten
      Project Manager
    • Janavi Rambhatla
      Academic Specialist - Research Officer
    • Devaki Pilapitiya
      PhD Student
    • Ruth Purcell
      PhD Student (co-supervisor with Amy Chung)
    • Kirsty Field
      PhD Student
    • Thu Do
      PhD Student
    • Yee-Chen Liu
      PhD Student
    • Veronica Zoest
      PhD Student
    • Nanouk Zuidmeer
      International Masters Student Placement
    • Professor David O'Connor
      Honorary
    • Professor Shelby O'Connor
      Honorary
    • Dr David (Yi) Ju
      Honorary
    • Dr Hillary Vanderven
      Honorary
    • A/Prof Matt Parsons
      Honorary
    • Dr Nghia Truong
      Honorary
    • Dr Sinth Jegaskanda
      Honorary
    • A/Prof Steve Rockman
      Honorary
    • Dr Emily Pilkington
      Guest Scientist
    • Dr Shiyao Li
      Guest Scientist
    • Diyana Hassanel
      Guest Scientist
    • Zihnil Mazrad
      Guest Scientist