Important Innovations

Another $472 Million in Funds from US Government Source:  Moderna Cambridge, MA Potentially Quick Vaccine Development and Delivery Cambridge, MA based Moderna just announced it has received an additional $472 million in funding from the US government's Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA).  That brings the total from BARDA to support the development of Moderna's novel COVID vaccine to $955 million. mRNA Moderna is the first pharma company in the US to begin human trials on a COVID vaccine.  Tomorrow, July 27th, a Phase 3 study  involving 30,000 participants will get underway with Moderna collaborating with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.  Moderna's vaccine candidate uses synthetic messenger RNA (mRNA) to help the body immunize against the virus. Potential Quick Delivery Moderna says it can deliver 500,000 doses of the vaccine per year and possibly 1 billion doses per year starting in 2021.  Experts say thei

Surprising Enterprise to Meet Global Vaccine Need Source:  CureVac TESLA & CureVac of Germany - Could It Be a Gamechanger? Tesla, the world's top electric vehicle manufacturer, is working with a German biotech CureVac to develop a COVID-19 vaccine.  CEO Elon Musk says, as a side project, he's building RNA microfactories for CureVac and possibly for other vaccine research groups.  On Twitter, Musk has said synthetic RNA has "amazing potential" as an approach to immunizing patients against COVID-19. CureVac Credentials CureVac is one of only 18 drug companies around the world with COVID-19 vaccine candidates in clinical testing.  The company is working with so-called messenger mRNA, which deliver instructions from DNA to the body's protein makers - ribosomes.  CureVac's approach is to customize mRNA to command ribosomes to make proteins that fight specific diseases like COVID or create antibodies to fight them.  Several other drug companies incl

UAE Tech & 2 Israeli Co's Partner to Fight COVID-19 Source:  COVID-19 Tech Fight Source:  Abu Dhabi Group 42 Signing Deal  Rare Arab-Israeli Big Partnership An astonishing example of Arab-Israeli cooperation has just emerged to fight the COVID-19 virus.  Two Israeli defense contractors, Israel Aerospace Industries and Raphael, and an Abu Dhabi based technology company Group 42, are joining forces to develop technologies to fight COVID-19.  This despite the fact that Israel has no diplomatic relations with a Gulf Arab nation.  The partnership has been forged by the urgent, common humanitarian concerns over the vicious nature of COVID-19's threat to every human being. Arab-Israeli Tech Partnership The three companies reached their remarkable agreement via video calls this weekend.  Abu Dhabi based Group 42 specializes in AI and cloud computing. It is led by CEO Peng Xiao.  Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) has a portfolio of both defense and civilian businesse

Human Testing on J&J Vaccine Starts in July Source:  COVID 19  New Glimmer of Hope Johnson and Johnson just announced its accelerating human trials of its potential COVID19 vaccine by months to July.  The trials will take place in the US and Belgium.  More than 1000 volunteers aged 18 to 55, plus another group over 65, will be involved. One Billion Doses J&J says it will test a placebo against the vaccine to determine the immunity results and its safety.  The company has signed an agreement with the US government to create enough manufacturing capacity to produce 1 billion doses of the vaccine through 2021.  J&J Chief Scientific Officer Paul Stoffels told Reuters:  "Based on the strength of the pre-clinical data and interactions with regulatory authorities, we've been able to further accelerate the clinical development" of the vaccine. Ten Vaccine Candidates In all, there are ten COVID vaccine candidates that have entered the human trials phase