Journal of Clinical and Cellular Immunology
Open Access
ISSN: 2155-9899
ISSN: 2155-9899
Kathleen Hefferon
Scientific Tracks Abstracts: J Clin Cell Immunol
Plant made biologics have elicited much attention over recent years for their potential in assisting those in developing countries who have poor access to modern medicine. Additional applications such as the stockpiling of vaccines against pandemic infectious diseases or potential biological warfare agents are also under investigation. Plant virus expression vectors represent a technology that enables high levels of pharmaceutical proteins to be produced in a very short period of time. Recent advances in research and development have brought about the generation of superior virus expression systems which can be readily delivered to the host plant in a manner that is both efficient and cost effective. The following presentation describes recent innovations in plant virus expression systems and their uses for producing biologics from plants.
Kathleen Hefferon received her PhD from the Department of Medical Biophysics, University of Toronto and continued her Post-doctoral studies at Cornell University. She has worked on faculty at the Division of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell and has written two books on biopharmaceuticals in plants. She teaches and conducts research at both the University of Toronto and Cornell University. She has 4 patents, has edited 6 books, and has multiple research publications.