Brussels CureVac, a company based in Tübingen, Germany, which develops vaccines and RNA-based therapies, has won a prize of € 2 million granted by the European Commission to stimulate new vaccine technology that could help developing countries. A jury of experts said the research the company could lead to a new generation of vaccines that do not require refrigeration, a huge advantage in many poor countries where power and equipment are rare.
Most of the prize money will go to new research and a company party, but CureVac also plans to use some of it to build an exhibition honoring Friedrich Miescher, a Swiss scientist of the 19th century the discovery of the nucleic acids are not widely known.
The so-called price incentives have become more frequent in recent years; the idea is to raise a social, scientific or specific technology, and drive innovation to solve, without prescribing how. Unlike research grants, they are accessible to everyone, not only to bona fide academic and economic actors. The price of the vaccine, awarded at a ceremony held here on Monday, is the first time that the European Commission has adopted the idea. . There will be more such awards in 2020, however, the new 7-year research funding program of the Commission
The Commission launched the vaccine price to encourage innovators to solve the "chain cold "problem: According to the world health Organization, up to half of all vaccine doses are wasted worldwide, in part because they are not transported and stored at a constant cool temperature. Of the 12 teams that submitted a complete application, several focused on improving refrigeration systems. CureVac but claims it can eliminate this need while producing vaccines that are stable at room temperature for long periods of time.
The company develops immunotherapies for cancer and prophylactic vaccines against infectious diseases, both RNA-based molecules. The main idea is to code for an antigen as the RNA and which inject in the patient's skin, whose own cells then produce the protein that elicits an immune response, either to kill tumor cells or to prevent infection. The most advanced project of CureVac is a prostate cancer therapy is now in a clinical study of a second Phase II; a vaccine against rabies is in Phase I trials In November 2012, the company has also shown, as well as scientists from the Friedrich Loeffler Institute, the technology could lead to a new generation of vaccines against influenza.
CEO CureVac Ingmar Hoerr said E.Ü. Competition opened its eyes to the potential of RNA-based vaccines for developing countries. In its application, the company showed the degree of RNA-based vaccines are stable. Experiments have shown that even after being stored at 40 ° C for 6 months, the vaccine against rabies protected the animals against virus infection. "We did not know we had vaccines [with such potential], because we focus on the demands of Western countries," admits Hoerr.
Jury member Penny Heaton, vaccine development director at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, said RNA technology CureVac had "the potential for a significant and positive impact on public health" in a statement released by the company on 10 March. Hoerr said that recognition gives the technology more credibility. "When we started the company, some people made fun of us, saying," [RNA] is an unstable molecule, I never think your data, it will never become a drug because it is so expensive, ' ". It reminds
"It is very encouraging that this prize fund seems to have succeeded in stimulating valuable innovative solutions," Helle Aagaard, politics and EU adviser advocacy for Médecins Sans Campaign to access to borders, said science Insider in an email. "But if these innovations will benefit the most needy children depend on how this technology develops and-critically-if it leads to, affordable and accessible vaccines tailored to the needs of the developing world," adds t- it.
Although most of the prize money of CureVac will go to basic research in molecular immunology, Hoerr said he also wants to reserve part to honor Miescher, the biologist Switzerland has identified nucleic acids, a family of key biological molecules including DNA and RNA, in his laboratory in Tübingen. CureVac has proposed reinstalling equipment in the 19th century Miescher laboratory in ancient Castle kitchen Tübingen, and open a public exhibition to highlight its scientific legacy. While James Watson and Francis Crick are considered the godfathers of DNA, Hoerr said, Miescher never received the credit that it deserved to isolate and analyze nucleic acids from pus cells.
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