About the Authors

Lena Muchnik

Contributed equally to this work with: Lena Muchnik, Asad Adawi

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Asad Adawi

Contributed equally to this work with: Lena Muchnik, Asad Adawi

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Ariel Ohayon

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Shahar Dotan

Affiliation Protea Vaccine Technologies and NasVax Ltd., Ness Ziona, Israel

Itai Malka

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Shalhevet Azriel

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Marilou Shagan

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Maxim Portnoi

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Daniel Kafka

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Hannie Nahmani

Affiliation The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Angel Porgador

Affiliation The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Johnatan M. Gershoni

Affiliation Department of Cell Research and Immunology, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel

Donald A. Morrison

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America

Andrea Mitchell

Affiliation School of Immunity and Infection, College of Medical and Dental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, United Kingdom

Michael Tal

Affiliation Protea Vaccine Technologies and NasVax Ltd., Ness Ziona, Israel

Ronald Ellis

Affiliation Protea Vaccine Technologies and NasVax Ltd., Ness Ziona, Israel

Ron Dagan

Affiliation Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel

Yaffa Mizrachi Nebenzahl

ymizr@bgu.ac.il

Affiliations Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Soroka University Medical Center, Beer Sheva, Israel, The Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel

Competing Interests

The study and part of the authors were partially funded by a commercial company (Nasvax Ltd./Protea Vaccine Technologies Ltd.) through the BGNegev Biotechnologies which is the BGU industrial liaison. Nasvax Ltd./Protea Vaccine Technologies Ltd. is the employer of authors Shahar Dotan, Michael Tal and Ronald Ellis. The NOX protein discussed in the enclosed manuscript is protected by several pending patents: US WO 03/082183; EP 1490104; PCT WO 2010/029546 A2. The protein vaccine is at an early stage of preclinical studies. There are no marketed products to declare. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials, as detailed online in the guide for authors.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: YMN RD RE MT DAM JMG AO SD AP. Performed the experiments: LM AO SD SA IM MS MP DK AA HN AP. Analyzed the data: AO SD. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: JMG AM. Wrote the paper: YMN AO SD.