sufficient vaccine in a timely fashion. It has been shown with VLP technology a potential vaccine can be prepared in around 12 weeks compared to more traditional 9 months.
Secondly, VLPs physically resemble the target virus but are non-infectious because they contain no viral genetic material. As a result, they represent an attractive option because of their safety and immunogenic characteristics. VLPs can also be produced in a variety of different cell culture systems including bacteria, mammalian cell lines, insect cell lines, yeast and plant cells. This provides a degree of flexibility and screening when a pandemic situation arises.
In the UK, the government is taking concerted and coordinated action to address the need to develop vaccines. It has committed to invest £120 million between 2016 and 2021 on the development of new vaccines for such diseases, in line with the expert advice provided by the UK Vaccines Network. This network brings together experts from industry, academia and funding bodies and its focus is to identify and shortlist targeted investment opportunities for the most promising vaccines and vaccine technologies that will help combat infectious diseases with epidemic potential.
With funding from the UK Vaccines Network, Leaf Expression Systems is at the forefront of vaccine research. The company will be using the plant based technology developed at the John Innes Centre to produce various VLPs, at scale, for further pre-clinical evaluation. Production of VLPs using plant based expression systems has a number of potential advantages over existing methods, namely around quick and rapid scale-up and reduced production costs. The method therefore, provides opportunities for rapid response to pandemics, but also for low middle income countries to access the products due to the lower cost of goods.
Leaf Expression Systems has also been awarded grant funding from SBRI and the Department of Health to develop VLPs as vaccines against emerging viral diseases. The aim is to facilitate rapid prototyping of target vaccines which can be produced cost effectively for use in low and middle income countries (LMIC).
Hypertrans® technology is a novel transient plant expression system using the non-cultivated tobacco species, N. Benthamiana. This fast-growing species can produce hundreds of plants ready for making products within as little time as a week. The flexible nature of the system enables production to be scaled from small research quantities to pilot plant scale production very quickly. The speed of the system means that it can rapidly produce large amounts of protein and so it is well suited to quickly responding to emergencies like pandemics.