Project to explore speed up of mRNA vaccine production deployable for local outbreaks

"AI-ready platform" could shorten current mRNA vaccine development timelines Platform designed to be easily deployable for local manufacture in outbreak response Continuous automated manufacturing would secure a rapid supply of vaccine Oslo, Norway and Cambridge, UK, July 22, 2024 - Scientists who specialize in biocomputing are exploring a new, accelerated approach to developing and producing mRNA vaccine platforms that will use AI in a highly integrated continuous system to manufacture mRNA vaccines locally to contain or stop a disease outbreak. The ambition is that taking a seamless automatic integration approach will help reduce the time it takes to develop and manufacture mRNA vaccine platforms, making them more easily and swiftly available for use in the event of a novel outbreak or a pandemic threat. The technology is suitable for transfer to LMIC regions to enable equitable access. The $320 000 project, funded by CEPI and led by BiologIC Technologies, could take one year to demonstrate a proof of concept. The scientists are using AI to identify the optimal operation of process modules to manufacture mRNA and LNPs. If this project succeeds the next step would be to develop a single integrated platform for manufacturing of mRNA-LNP. This can easily be deployed for decentralised scalable manufacturing at a local level as a rapid response to a pandemic. Richard Hatchett, CEO of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, said, "Speed and decentralized vaccine manufacturing are key if we are to overcome the devastating vaccine inequity we witnessed during the COVID-19 pandemic. BiologIC Technologies' innovative approach to vaccine manufacturing that could be rapidly deployed in case of an outbreak is a promising step towards a world where we are able to fight, contain and avert pandemics and fits well with CEPI's 100 Days Mission." Richard Vellacott, CEO of BiologIC Technologies, said, "Our precision bioprocessing system, built by integrating and adapting common modules to execute end-to-end applications, is being rapidly adopted by modern biotechnology enterprises across many fields of advanced therapy development and manufacturing. The system, enabled by our proprietary biocomputer technology, is particularly amenable to accelerating the development of mRNA-LNP vaccines in response to a pandemic threat, rapid production of clinical trial materials and distribution of manufacturing to the point of need anywhere in the world. We are excited to collaborate with the eminent scientists at CEPI to advance this leading bioprocessing capability and contribute towards protecting global populations from the threat of infectious diseases in an equitable way". CEPI is funding this exploratory proof of concept project for the development of an automated and integrated system for the manufacture of mRNA vaccine and formulation into LNPs. BiologIC Technologies is developing an end-to-end, modular, continuous production system where each component of the mRNA-LNP production process will be developed and optimised in parallel. The plan is that completion of the project will interlink the modules to form a continuous process, demonstrating full automation to significantly accelerate vaccine development time and scalability. This would reduce vaccine manufacturing time compared to traditional manual processes.