ConserV and eTheRNA partner on infectious disease vaccines
pharmafile | March 4, 2021 | News story | | ConserV, eTheRNA, vaccines
ConserV Bioscience and eTheRNA immunotherapies have agreed to collaborate on the development of vaccine candidates for infectious diseases.
ConserV is clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on developing vaccines that protect against endemic and emergent infectious diseases, and eTheRNA immunotherapies is a clinical-stage immunotherapy company focused on mRNA antigen delivery and immunostimulation using its TriMix technology.
It is hoped that by combining the companies’ technologies, the new vaccines will induce potent immune responses to protect against highly mutagenic viruses.
The collaboration brings together ConserV’s expertise in identifying broadly-protective antigens and eTheRNA’s TriMix immunostimulatory mRNA technology and novel lipid nanoparticle (LNP) encapsulation technologies.
Initially, the partnership will focus on the development and evaluation of mRNA vaccine formulations against human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), with the objective of identifying a lead formulation to move forward to clinical development. The collaboration may also develop other mRNA vaccine formulations based upon ConserV’s antigen portfolio.
ConserV’s candidate antigens include conserved regions from both internal and external viral proteins containing clusters of reactive T-cell epitopes for multiple human leukocyte antigens.
eTheRNA’s TriMix contains three mRNA molecules (caTLR4, CD40L, and CD70) that work to produce a potent, durable T-cell-mediated immune response when combined. The company has also developed proprietary LNPs to be used as targeted delivery vehicles for mRNA, and is developing an intranasal delivery vehicle which, combined with TriMix, aims to induce antigen-specific T-cell-mediated mucosal immunity.
Kimbell Duncan, CEO of ConserV Bioscience, said: “Our mission is to develop safe and effective vaccines which offer broad protection against infections from viruses that mutate frequently.
“We are pleased to be working with eTheRNA to develop mRNA-based vaccine formulations of our antigen constructs, in combination with eTheRNA’s TriMix and LNP technologies, in order to expand our development pipeline. This follows the recent collaboration with the US government’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to develop a broad-spectrum coronavirus vaccine.”
Steven Powell, CEO of eTheRNA immunotherapies, also commented: “The potential of combining eTheRNA’s mRNA and LNP technologies with ConserV’s antigens is exciting.
“The collaboration has the potential to demonstrate the added benefits of our vaccine platform in enhancing immune responses to antigens targeting viruses that mutate regularly.”
Darcy Jimenez
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