By Allan Maurer
BIRMINGHAM, AL–A small Birmingham, Alabama company, Vaxin, is testing a revolutionary new flu vaccine that could lessen or end flu vaccine shortages, avoid getting the wrong mix of strains, and alleviate fears of deadly pandemic flu.
Vaxin’s influenza vaccine, which has been tested in animal studies and a Phase I human clinical trial, employs a recombinant adenovirus to deliver an influenza antigen to the nose, where it stimulates a protective immune response.
Needleless vaccine delivery to the nose stimulates multiple arms of the immune system, offering protection at least as good as traditional vaccines, and because the virus is modified to not replicate, it does not have some of the issues associated with live-virus vaccines.
Game-changing manufacturing method
The way the vaccine is made could help prevent flu shortages or getting the wrong strains, which happened last year. Vaxin’s flu vaccine is made from cell cultures rather than produced in chicken eggs.
Among the many benefits to this manufacturing process is that the product availability is not dependent on the long lead times required to secure chicken eggs every year, which may be important especially in the event of a pandemic.
The use of cell culture manufacturing eliminates the possibility of contamination with the avian flu virus, a risk inherent in egg-based production.
The Vaxin process provides higher yields, greater quantities in a faster timeframe, and more reliable manufacturing than the egg-based process.
Also, because the Vaxin process does not need to be adapted to grow in eggs to achieve higher yields, the Vaxin vaccine is “truer” to the strains picked by the regulatory agencies.
Raising a B round
Founded in 1997 with technology from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Vaxin raised close to $25 million from venture capitalists, angel investors, government grants and strategic partnerships. The 12-employee company is seeking a B round of from $15 million to $20 million.
Current investors include Redmont Venture Partners.
CEO and President Bill Enright tells TechJournal South the company originally tested a vaccine delivered via a skin patch after UAB scientist De-chu Tang, Vaxin VP and CTO, discovered that rather than acting as a barrier to bacteria, the skin pulls in those it sees often, breaks them down and produced a good immune response.
Internasal delivery worked a lot better than the skin patch in testing, an unexpected result, which sent the company back to the lab. With a cell line acquired from a Dutch company, it created a new vaccine it’s testing now.
Its first vaccine targets the bird flu that scientists worry might mutate so that it can be passed from person to person with the possibility of creating a deadly pandemic. It is also working on a typical seasonal flu vaccine.
100 percent protection in animal studies
Vaxin’s method of making its vaccines in cell cultures could give it extra time to decide which strains to include in a seasonal flu vaccine, making it more likely it has the right ones. Last year’s flu vaccine missed one strain that made a lot of people sick whether they had flu shots or not.
“Right now they decide on which strains should go in the flu vaccine in February. We think we could wait until March or April,” says Enright, who joined Vaxin in June. Prior to Vaxin, he was head of business development at GenVec, where he helped the company raise $140 million in funding for vaccine related initiatives.
Vaccines are tested the same way drugs are and must go through a series of clinical trials for safety, efficacy and dosage. The company expects to begin another Phase I human clinical study within a few weeks.
In animal tests, Enright says, it provides 100 percent protection.
Initial product development is targeted towards an improved influenza vaccine manufactured in cell culture, and vaccines for anthrax, RSV and tetanus/diphtheria. Earlier stage programs include therapeutic vaccines to address disease targets such as Alzheimer’s and cancer.
On the Web: www.vaxin.com
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