With the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, SK Bioscience will develop a nasal antiviral drug with overseas research institutes.
SK Bioscience announced on the 13th that it will develop an innovative form of medicine that prevents infections such as the Corona 19 virus in all directions by spraying antiviral protein into the nasal passages.
For this project, overseas research institutes such as the International AIDS Vaccine Promotion Center (IAVI) and the Institute for Antigen Design (IPD) at the University of Washington will cooperate through the R&D fund supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. IPD has jointly developed SK Bioscience’s COVID-19 vaccine ‘GBP510’ using self-assembly nanoparticle design technology.
BMGF supports R&D expenses to IAVI, and SK Bioscience will receive about $2.2 million (about 2.65 billion won) from IAVI in priority for initial non-clinical development expenses. SK Bioscience plans to use the subsidy for initial process research for discovery and production of candidate materials.
The candidate material for this project, developed by SK Bioscience through international cooperation, is the ‘Nasal Spray’ method, and it is characterized by being able to quickly and conveniently use it for quarantine in a situation where the Corona 19 virus is rapidly spreading. It is a principle that prevents the virus from penetrating into our body by forming a protective film on the inside of the nose when nasal spraying. In particular, nasal spray-type pharmaceuticals can be stored at room temperature, so manufacturing and distribution are easy, and they have the advantage that they can be used multiple times as a multi-dose formulation.
Nasal spray received attention as a groundbreaking technology when a paper was published in the international scientific journal ‘Science’ in September 2020 that it can be widely applied to various infectious diseases and can have therapeutic effects as well as prevention. SK Bioscience expects that when the product is commercialized, it will serve as the first line of defense to prevent the spread of the virus, such as the mask that played the most important role in preventing the spread of this pandemic.
SK Bioscience received the technology of the candidate material being researched and developed by the IPD and started development and research on the initial process, and plans to produce candidate materials for non-clinical and clinical use. SK Bioscience, together with IAVI and IPD, plans to build a nasal spray as a platform for pharmaceuticals for the prevention and treatment of respiratory viruses to broadly expand the scope of application.
Ahn Jae-yong, president of SK Bioscience, said, “If we secure a differentiated virus infection prevention and treatment through this research, we will be able to respond quickly to the evolving respiratory virus. Our efforts are leading to various international cooperation, and through this, SK Bioscience is also evolving into a global company,” he said.
