The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has shown the need to be prepared for an outbreak of an infectious disease. It spurred one of the most promising scientific breakthroughs in the last century – the development and acceptance of a new class of vaccines based on mRNA.
The vaccines of Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna have shown that mRNA vaccines are extremely suitable for rapid development. This is an important feature as viruses, like SARS-CoV-2, constantly mutate as they spread. Although the authorised vaccines provide protection against the variants that are currently prevalent, with continued mutations and new variants emerging, vaccines may need to be adapted.
20Med Therapeutics in collaboration with, Wageningen University and University of Twente has started research into the development of vaccine variants based on 20Med’s ready-to-use polymer nanoparticle vaccine delivery platform.
In the first phase of the project, which has been successfully completed, the efficacy of the platform has been tested using the 20Med polymer nanoparticle technology in combination with the mRNA based on the first variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus from Wuhan.
In the next phase new mRNA constructs will be designed and tested, based on the knowledge that is available about the different virus variants.
Collaboration partners 20Med is collaborating with Wageningen University department of Virology and the department of Biomaterial Science and Technology of the University of Twente to test the efficacy of multiple polymer nanoparticle mRNA vaccine candidates in preclinical models.
This research is funded by Oost NL via het Europees Fonds voor Regionale Ontwikkeling (EFRO).
