Meet Dr. Sara Gilbert, One Of The Race Leading Scientists To Find The Covid-19 Vaccine

Professor Sara Gilbert leads the development of the coronavirus vaccine at Oxford University in Oxford, April 24, 2020. (Mary Turner / The New York Times)

Earlier this week, they were positive about the Oxford vaccine candidate, one of the frontline candidates to protect the world from the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which infected about 15.5 million people by the morning of Friday (July 24) There was news. Over 630,000 people were killed worldwide.

Leading its development are British scientists who play oboe, cycle to work and are the mother of Triplet. Dr. Sara Gilbert was well-known in the scientific community as an excellent vaccinologist. Her success in early trials has helped her and her team work on a vaccine candidate, ChAdOx1 nCoV-19, to get more attention than ever before.

Gilbert and co-authors published the results of the initial trial in the medical journal “The Lancet” on July 20th. “Safety and Immunogenicity of the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 Vaccine against SARS-CoV-2: Phase 1 Preliminary Report / 2, Single-Blind Randomized Controlled Trial”. They found that “ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 showed an acceptable safety profile and a homologous boost showed an increased antibody response.” This suggests that the vaccine candidate elicits an immune response (which the vaccine does). It means that it was safe for people.

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What is Dr. Gilbert’s job in the area of ​​vaccine development?

Dr. Gilbert is one of the world’s leading vaccinologists. She is a professor of vaccinology at the Jenner Institute at the renowned Vaccine Research Center, Oxford University, and is one of two founders of Vaccitech, a spin-out company that develops immunotherapy products for the treatment and prevention of infectious diseases. People. cancer..

For over 15 years, Dr. Gilbert has created and tested vaccines that induce T cells, a type of white blood cell, that specifically react to antigens such as malaria, influenza, and tuberculosis.

Her research also includes the development of vaccines against influenza and emerging diseases such as Lassa, Nipah, CCHF, and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS). MERS, which also appeared in 2014, Coronavirus.. “The vaccine against MERS has been tested in a clinical trial in the UK and is being tested in Saudi Arabia, where the virus is currently endemic,” said Gilbert’s page on the Jenner Institute website.

The MERS vaccine included the use of an adenovirus (causing a cold) from chimpanzees that was implanted with the genetic material of the MERS virus. for COVID-19 In the vaccine, Oxford scientists used a chimpanzee adenovirus embedded with genetic material from spike proteins. It is used by coronavirus to pierce cells. In previous tests, participants’ bodies responded as if they were infected with a coronavirus.

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Samples of coronavirus vaccine trials from different parts of the country are processed within Oxford Vaccine Group Labs in Oxford. England Thursday, June 25, 2020 (John Cairns, Oxford University via AP)

What is known about the life of a prominent scientist away from her job?

Dr. Gilbert hasn’t had many interviews since the early results of the exam were announced. In a previous profile of British media scientists, as a child of the Kettering High School for Girls in Northamptonshire, she was quiet, polite, eager to study, and studied many A’s.

Gilbert belonged to a family of musicians and his mother Hazel was part of the town’s opera community. But by the age of 17, Gilbert was convinced he wanted to be a medical researcher. After earning a degree in biology from the University of East Anglia and a PhD in biochemistry from Hull University, Dr. Gilbert worked at several biotechnology companies (such as Delta) to learn about pharmaceutical manufacturing.

Gilbert’s profile points out that she happened to be a vaccine expert. When she entered Oxford University in 1994 and joined senior postdoc in Professor Adrian Hill’s lab, it was about working on human genetics. “It emphasized the role of a particular type of immune response in the defense against malaria, so the next step was to make a vaccine that worked through that type of immune response-that I got into the vaccine. That’s the way,” she told the British Telegraph newspaper in an interview.

By 2007, Dr. Gilbert, who became a Oxford University reader three years ago, received a project grant from the Welcome Trust and undertook research on the influenza vaccine. She has developed two vaccines against this disease to date, and says her ultimate goal is to enable a team of scientists to be the leaders in vaccine research worldwide. ..

Doctors will take blood samples for use in the coronavirus vaccine trial in Oxford, UK on Thursday, June 25, 2020. (John Cairns, Oxford University via AP)

Many are fascinated by the success of Dr. Gilbert in balancing his scientific career with the extra demands faced by women.

Women make up less than 30 percent of the world’s researchers, according to UNESCO. In the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, women also “publish less, pay less for research, and less advanced than men in their careers.”

On the Naufeld School of Medicine website (part of which is the Jenner Institute where she works), Dr. Gilbert said: “Work-life balance is very difficult and impossible to manage without adequate support. Since I had triplets in 1998, childcare costs my entire income as a postdoctoral scientist. It takes more than that, and my partner had to sacrifice his career to care for the children.”

She explained how three premature babies were cared for and how hard it was to achieve an 18-week paid maternity leave to complete. Of the project. The situation gets worse when multiple people are separated at the same time. “

Dr. Gilbert’s advice to women: “One of the good things about being a scientist is that there is a lot of flexibility for working mothers because there is no fixed time. But things ( Sometimes you have to make regular sacrifices (such as international meetings or important meetings), which can be a daunting task. Make sure you plan ahead and have someone at home to support you at work. It’s important to confirm. It may be your partner or relatives, or you may be able to buy with assistance.”

Her children were “survived intact, but don’t want to be scientists,” she said.

Big question: Is there a vaccine this year?

Dr. Gilbert is cautiously expecting. She said in an interview with the BBC, “No one can be sure that it is possible. That’s why we have to test. I think the outlook is very good, I’m not completely certain.”

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