Selecta Biosciences, a clinical stage biotechnology company developing a novel class of targeted antigen-specific immune therapies, announced today that it has been awarded a $1.25 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The grant supports the research by Selecta for a novel dual action, immune-activating Synthetic Vaccine Particle (SVP) for malaria.
Selecta’s proprietary SVP technology can be designed to activate the immune system in order to enable dual action vaccines by individually optimizing nanoparticles against multiple antigens and by allowing their combinatorial testing. If successful, a dual action, immune-activating SVP nanoparticle vaccine could offer the potential to protect against malaria by both fighting the parasite during early infection, and simultaneously blocking malaria transmission via infected mosquitoes. The biodegradable nanoparticle also permits targeted delivery and controlled release of immune boosting adjuvants to relevant immune cells, thereby shielding the adjuvants from interactions with other cells that may induce the undesirable side-effects associated with other adjuvants.