According to a study published in the peer-reviewed journal Viruses, a potential SarsCov2 vaccine being developed in India that does not require refrigeration or cold-chain storage generated a large number of antibodies in mice testing against widespread viral types.
The Bengaluru-based Mynvax laboratories, a firm incubated at the Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, produced a ‘warm’ vaccination that can be stored at 37 degrees Celsius for four weeks and at 100 degrees Celsius for up to 90 minutes, making it unique among existing vaccines.
The majority of other vaccines must be kept in refrigerators and can only be maintained at room temperature for a few hours. The test of vaccination, on the other hand, is if it can elicit a sufficiently high antibody response from the immune system and whether it is effective against the three variants: Alpha, Delta, and Omicron.
Existing vaccines are based on the Wuhan strain template
Existing vaccines are based on the Wuhan strain template, however current versions have major structural alterations that increase their chances of evading immune system-generated antibodies.
When compared to antibodies generated against the wild type of the virus, researchers from Mynvax and Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Organisation (CSIRO) found a 14.4-fold reduction in neutralization against BA.1.1 for the three monomeric antigen-adjuvant combinations and a 16.5-fold reduction for the three trimeric antigen-adjuvant combinations.
The reduction was 3-5 times when compared to the Delta variations. Different forms that can be utilized to make vaccines are referred to as monomeric and trimeric.
The COVID-19 vaccine candidate contains a region of the novel coronavirus’s spike protein known as the receptor-binding domain (RBD), which helps the virus stick to the host’s cell. It is being developed by Raghavan Varadarajan, Professor at the Molecular Biophysics Unit, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), in collaboration with Mynvax, a startup co-founded by him and incubated at IISc, as well as several other institutes. The company was established in 2017 with the goal of developing flu vaccinations.
“The 14.4- or 16.5-fold reduction in neutralization against Omicron BA.1.1 reported with the monomeric and trimeric formulations, respectively, compares favorably with corresponding reductions observed with leading COVID-19 vaccines,” the researchers write.
They go on to say that the data show the vaccine is ready for human testing. Nearly 10 billion doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been provided two years into the pandemic, meaning that 4.4 billion people around the world have been fully immunized. However, about half of the world’s population is still receiving their first dose of COVID-19 vaccines, primarily in low- and lower-middle-income countries (LICs) and lower-middle-income countries (LMICs). They also point out that these countries lack cold storage facilities, which is where the Mynvax could be effectively administered.