Register
Printable version
AIDS Vaccine 2010
Biography - Dr. Harriet Robinson
Dr. Harriet L. Robinson, Senior Vice President for Research and Development at GeoVax Inc., a biotech company
specializing in the development of HIV/AIDS vaccines, has a multi-protein clade B DNA/MVA vaccine in phase 2a
clinical trials through the US HIV vaccine Trials Network (HVTN). The vaccine was developed in Dr. Robinson's
former laboratory at the Emory Vaccine Center in collaboration with Dr. Bernard Moss's laboratory at the US NIH and
researchers at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The vaccine DNA is used to prime the immune
response and the recombinant MVA to boost the immune responses. The recombinant MVA can also be used to
prime and boost the immune response. Dr. Robinson co-founded GeoVax, which licensed the vaccine, to facilitate
taking the vaccine from the research laboratory to clinical use.
Dr. Robinson, former Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at Emory University and Chief of
the Division of Microbiology and Immunology at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center, is internationally
recognized for her work on HIV/AIDS vaccines, her pioneering studies on the use of recombinant DNA for vaccination
and her seminal studies on insertional mutagenesis and oncogene transduction in retroviral induced cancers. She
received her Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and her post doctoral training at the Virus
Laboratory, University of California Berkeley. Dr. Robinson is active on several Editorial Boards and has consulted for
the US NIH, the US Food and Drug Administration, the World Health Organization, and the Gates Foundation.