Dr. Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Tokyo in Japan will develop broadly effective influenza vaccines by mixing together epitopes of conserved fragments of the viral hemagglutinin (HA) protein, which only elicit a weak immune response, together with millions of different, non-naturally occurring fragments that elicit a strong immune response, to induce broadly cross-reacting antibodies. Influenza is of world-wide concern severely impacting public health and the global economy. Tens of millions of reported cases result in tens of thousands of deaths annually in the U.S. alone, and the rapid spread of the virus between countries causes epidemic or pandemic outbreaks. Traditional vaccines are directed towards selected epitopes in the head region of the viral HA protein because they elicit a strong immune response. However, these regions are frequently mutated, rendering the vaccines useless. Vaccines directed towards more conserved epitopes only elicit a weak immune response, but this can be strengthened using HA proteins previously unseen by the immune system. They will produce a library of millions of HA epitopes that contain artificial mutations in the immune-dominant regions while preserving the conserved regions. This should focus the production of highly reactive antibodies against the conserved HA epitopes, which will eliminate a wider range of influenza strains. They will test this using single and repeat immunizations of different mixes in ferrets. Once optimized, the vaccination strategy will be tested in ferrets pre-exposed to influenza virus to mimic the human situation. The result will be a single vaccination that protects against a wider range of influenza strains than traditional vaccines.

David Hughes of Pennsylvania State University, John Corbett of aWhere, and Rhiannan Price of DigitalGlobe, in the U.S. will develop a software platform comprising prediction algorithms that leverage artificial intelligence to predict where and when plant diseases and pests will occur from weather and satellite data to alert farmers to check their crops. Pests and diseases are moving targets, however most current surveillance methods monitor only their presence or absence. Predicting when and where they are likely to occur would be more valuable for preventing them. This has recently been made possible by studies on how environmental factors influence the emergence and behaviour of crop pests and diseases. They will use a systems approach that incorporates these new predictors along with historical data and couples them with an artificial intelligence component that learns from ground observations recorded using smartphones to improve accuracy. They will combine their existing agricultural intelligence platform and smartphone application with their prototype predictive model and test their approach with maize and cassava crops on farms across seven different counties in Kenya. The platform will produce location-specific forecasts that can be acted upon immediately by farmers.

Ross Durland and colleagues at AM Biotechnologies, LLC in the U.S. propose to develop X-­aptamers for detecting and quantifying protein biomarkers for neglected diseases. X­-aptamers are modified nucleic acids that tightly bind to specific targets and remain stable at high temperature and humidity. AM Biotech will enhance its process for rapidly identifying X-­aptamers that will be integrated into a point­-of-­care platform for diagnosing many diseases.

Jacob Glanville of Distributed Bio in the U.S. will complete the pre-clinical development of Centivax Flu, a universal vaccine to protect humans and livestock against all forms of seasonal and pandemic influenza, in order to begin first-in-human studies in 2021. Pandemic and seasonal influenza have killed millions of people – the 1918 pandemic alone caused more deaths than World War One – and has led to widespread culling of infected swine and poultry populations. Current vaccines target highly variable regions of seasonal influenza and must be redesigned annually. In addition, population growth, expanded travel networks, and industrial farming practices have increased the risk of pandemic outbreaks. Centivax consists of low doses of 30 computationally-selected, distant evolutionary variants of influenza hemagluttinin (HA) protein epitopes. When the vaccine is administered, only B cells that recognize conserved epitopes respond, and the result is a broad and highly effective immune response that destroys the virus. In this project, they will optimize the formulation with four new adjuvant types, and confirm the conformational stability of the proteins in each. They will also optimize in vivo delivery of the vaccine in domestic pig, and evaluate its safety and efficacy in pigs and ferrets. The veterinary vaccine is expected to be on the market, and the human vaccine ready for human testing, in 2021.