A smallpox vaccine firm Acambis in Cambridge, U.K.,  has won an approximately $400 million contract with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to provide “ready-to-go” or “warm base” manufacturing facilities over the next decade.

The CDC wants access to a ready supply of the vaccine in case of a bio-terrorism attack and has already stock-piled sufficient quantities to vaccinate every American citizen. 

An Acambis plant, in Massachusetts, will produce a minimum of nine million doses a year from year three to year 10 of the pact. 

Acambis developed its smallpox vaccine under a contract with the CDC, and has delivered millions of doses for the stockpile. Under the terms of this latest deal, the value could rise substantially if there is a sudden need for additional doses.

“This contract marks the achievement of one of our major corporate goals. It is highly satisfying to know that, following eight years’ collaboration with the CDC to develop this vaccine, this core part of the U.S. Government’s defence against smallpox has been secured by us for the long term,” said Garland, chief executive officer of Acambis.

Coinciding with the announcement, the company said it plans to raise approximately $100 million through a share placing which is underwritten by JPMorgan Cazenove and Piper Jaffray.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, Editorial Director

Electronic microscope image of smallpox.

Posted: April 23rd, 2008 under Diseases, Smallpox.
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A new, oil-based emulsion placed in a patient’s nose has proven able to produce a strong immune response against “smallpox and HIV,” according to two new scientific studies.

The results build on previous success in animal studies with a nasal nanoemulsion vaccine for the flu.

Nanoemulsion vaccines developed at the Michigan Nanotechnology Institute for Medicine and the Biological Sciences at the University of Michigan are based on a mixture of soybean oil, alcohol, water and detergents and are emulsified into “ultra-small particles smaller than 400 nanometers wide,” or 1/200th the width of a human hair. When combined the disease-causing microbe, they trigger the body’s immune response, just as an innoculation with needles.

A team led by Michigan scientist Dr. James Baker Jr., M.D., the institute’s director, pioneered the new, modern technology.

“The two studies show the nanoemulsion platform is capable of developing vaccines from very diverse materials. We used whole virus in the smallpox vaccine. In the HIV vaccine, we used a single protein. We were able to promote an immune response using either source,” says Baker.

Most interestingly, in antiquity, a cow pox vaccination was administered to patients through the nose by physicians of Chinese medicine, experts in the history of medicine note.

NanoBio Corp., an Ann Arbor-based biotech company which Baker founded in 2000, has licensed the technology.  Baker is the Ruth Dow Doan Professor of internal medicine and Allergy Division chief at the University of Michigan Medical School.

The surface tension of the nanoparticles disrupts membranes and destroys microbes but does not harm most human cells due to their location within body tissues. Nanoemulsion vaccines are highly effective at penetrating the mucous membranes in the nose and initiating strong and protective types of immune response, Baker says. U-M researchers are also exploring nasal nanoemulsion vaccines to protect against “bioterrorism agents and hepatitis B.”

The smallpox results, which appear in the February issue of Clinical Vaccine Immunology, could lead to an effective human vaccine against smallpox that is safer than the present live-vaccinia virus vaccine, says Baker.

– The Editors

Nasal vaccines are made up of droplets 200 nanometers in size. Source: Michigan Nanotechnology Institute.

Posted: February 29th, 2008 under HIV, Smallpox.
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The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded a $1.65 million grant to a biotech firm, based in Portland, Ore., called Najít Technologies, as part of the ongoing U.S. anti-terror research effort.

The money will be used by the firm, a spin-off of the Oregon Health & Science University, to develop diagnostic tests that will help detect suspected bioterrorist attacks.

According to Mark Slifka, an associate scientist at OHSU’s Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute and president and chief scientific officer of Najít, the research team will work to develop rapid and accurate diagnostic tests for poxviruses, including smallpox and monkeypox.

Slifka says Anne Rimoin, an epidemiologist and assistant professor at the University of California at Los Angeles, will also be a member of the research team.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, Editorial Director

Image of child infected with monkeypox virus. Source: Centers for Disease Control

Posted: February 12th, 2008 under Smallpox.
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Scientists have discovered new information about a key protein that enables the smallpox virus to “replicate and wreak havoc” on the human immune system.

The findings further science’s understanding of how the pox family of viruses work to subvert the immune system, researchers indicate. Researchers believe their work may one day be used to develop new drugs to combat a variety of inflammatory and immunological disorders, including rheumatoid arthritis and some forms of heart disease.

Research is now focusing on a powerful substance called interferon-gamma binding protein, which helps the poxviruses replicate.

“Cracking open and describing the structure and actions of interferon-gamma binding protein is incredibly exciting, given the important role this substance plays in subverting the immune system,” said Mark Buller, Ph.D., professor of microbiology and immunology at the Saint Louis University School of Medicine and one of the study’s authors.

The findings are important for the following reasons:

* When a virus enters the bloodstream, the immune system responds by producing a substance called interferon-gamma, which assists the development of the immune response that is responsible for stopping the virus.

* But, poxviruses come encoded with a potent weapon to evade the immune system: interferon-gamma binding protein.

As its name suggests, the protein literally binds to interferon-gamma and immobilizes it, preventing it from summoning the immune system’s defenses. The poxvirus is then able to replicate and damage the body.

– by Gene J. Koprowski, Editorial Director

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080131122956.htm

Smallpox infection. Source: University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh.

Posted: February 5th, 2008 under Feature Stories, Smallpox.
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