Our research in vaccines

"If you asked a public health professional to draw up a top-ten list of the achievements of the past century, he or she would be hard pressed not to rank immunisation first. In short, the vaccine represents the single greatest promise of biomedicine: disease prevention".

Alexandra Stern
Associate Director of the Center for the History of Medicine, University of Michigan

The story of vaccinology begins with Edward Jenner, who created the world's first vaccine for smallpox in the 1790s. His observation that cowpox protected humans from smallpox laid the foundation for modern vaccinology, one of the greatest scientific advancements of the past century.

Since then we have witnessed an enormous decline in many infectious diseases and more recently the potential for prevention of some cancers due to the development of new vaccines.

Our research in vaccines is divided into two crucial areas: vaccine trials and vaccine safety.