A team of researchers at Emory University has been awarded a $6 million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to aid in finding an effective vaccine for HIV/AIDS, the university announced today.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was created by Microsoft founder Bill Gates and his wife, Melinda, to combat global poverty and to enhance healthcare across the world.

The grant was awarded as part of the Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery, an international network of researchers devoted to creating a variety of HIV vaccination candidates with the ultimate goal of advancing the most promising candidates to clinical trials.

Bali Pulendran, PhD, will lead the Emory Vaccine Center team, which includes scientists from Yerkes National Primate Research Center and the Emory Vaccine Center.

The Emory team led a project in nonhuman primates aimed at programming innate immunity to the disease.

Emory's Vaccine Center has received a series of grants in the last two years that have totaled more than $30 million.

Top photo: Billionaire Warren Buffett (left) alongside Melinda and Bill Gates (via gatesfoundation.org)