Research
The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) awarded $73 million in cooperative agreements to 10 academic institutions last week through its Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) to foster more public health information technology... Read More »
South Dakota-based Synthetik Applied Technologies, LLC has secured a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program award to develop explosives and illicit drugs detection technology.
Officials indicated Synthetik Applied Technologies, LLC was selected... Read More »
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has earmarked over $1 million for research on countering potential unmanned aerial systems (UAS) threats.
The funding allotment to the University of North Dakota (UND) stemmed from the efforts of Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) as a member of the Senate Homeland... Read More »
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Thursday that her state would open up a $40 million Biodefense Commercialization Fund to support the state’s growing Life Science industry.
The fund would provide grants to companies within the state working to bring to market infectious disease solutions... Read More »
A new report from Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) has found that 20 years after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, America is not fully prepared for public health emergencies.
The report, 2021 Ready or Not: Protecting the Public’s Health from Diseases,... Read More »
Thanks to collaborations with commercial and academic research partners alike, the Argonne National Laboratory has published new research showing the capabilities of artificial intelligence and simulation workflows to provide insight to the SARS-CoV-2 viral genome and potentially fuel drug... Read More »
A new House bill introduced by United States Reps. Mike Turner (R-OH), Jason Crow (D-CO), and Brad Wenstrup (R-OH) -- the Havana Syndrome Service Member Support Act -- seeks to provide aid for those with Havana Syndrome-induced brain injuries and initiate federal efforts to address related... Read More »
Approximately 4,000 people from all over the world will be enrolled in a Phase 3 trial of a combined SK bioscience and GlaxoSmithKline plc (GSK) adjuvanted COVID-19 vaccine candidate beginning this week.
The trial will combine the SK COVID-19 vaccine candidate GBP510 with GSK’s pandemic... Read More »
The World Health Organization (WHO) released a compendium this week consisting of 24 innovative health technologies that could be used by low and middle-income countries to advance disease preparedness and response.
“Innovative technologies are accelerating access to healthcare everywhere, but... Read More »
Thinking up ways to better address future public health emergencies, the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority’s (BARDA) Division of Research, Innovation and Ventures (DRIVe) has expanded a partner program focused on technology development to include digital health tools and... Read More »
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) began a Phase 2 clinical trial last week to investigate any antibody response generated by an extra dose of authorized/approved COVID-19 vaccines among patients with autoimmune disease who experienced no response from a previous vaccine regimen.
The... Read More »
According to a new paper from the nonprofit Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), artificial intelligence in nuclear weapons systems is a neutral wash of possibilities -- but it also appears inevitable, and as a result, immediate action is needed to balance benefits and risks while the technology is... Read More »
New voices were added to the United States Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Tick-Borne Disease Working Group this week, filling positions left vacant by public members looking to workshop ideas on how best to counter rising cases of tick-borne illnesses.
In all, seven new members... Read More »
INOVIO received the green light for phase three of its INNOVATE Phase 2/3 clinical trial of INO-4800 last week, allowing it to proceed with efficacy evaluation of its COVID-19 DNA vaccine candidate in Brazil.
Alongside its partner, Advaccine Biopharmaceuticals Suzhou Co., Ltd., INOVIO intends to... Read More »
The largest ever Lassa Fever study in West Africa secured the means of testing this week, thanks to a contract between the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) and Zalgen Labs LLC, which will supply antibody testing kits for up to 7,000 participants.
Zalgen, a biotechnology... Read More »
New data released by Johnson & Johnson this week showed that using its single-shot COVID-19 vaccine as a booster for the previously vaccinated could provide as much as a nine-fold increase in antibodies for patients at least 18 years old.
The news follows interim reports from July, published in... Read More »
Through publication of data in Vaccine, this week Soligenix showcased the capabilities of its filovirus vaccine platform to formulate and provide heat stabilization for multiple antigen combinations of vaccine candidates: monovalent, bivalent, and trivalent.
The single-vial platform project was... Read More »
A 210-person Phase 2 clinical trial for the COVID-19 vaccine candidate, ABNCoV2, began this week to determine its potential as a booster vaccine for those who have either caught the disease previously or been otherwise vaccinated.
Licensed by Bavarian Nordic A/S and developed by AdaptVac, the... Read More »
Results of a Phase 3 clinical trial have shown that AstraZeneca’s antibody combination for COVID-19, AZD7442, cuts the risk of symptomatic COVID-19 cases by 77 percent for at least three months.
That is dependent on the treatment being taken prior to infection. However, the antibodies used in... Read More »
With the formation of a new Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens (SAGO), the World Health Organization (WHO) is calling for experts to lend their knowledge on the origins of pathogens with wide-reaching potential.
This multidisciplinary group will consist of up to 25... Read More »
While key federal agencies prepared interagency response plans and conducted 74 interagency exercises from 2009 through 2019 to prepare for and respond to a wide variety of biological incidents, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently determined that the agencies weren’t on the same... Read More »
According to preclinical data produced by Soligenix, Inc. this week, positive, effective results have been demonstrated by multiple filovirus vaccine candidates.
In collaboration with the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Soligenix’s vaccines proved capable against three potentially deadly... Read More »
Utilizing initial funding from the American Rescue Plan, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) unveiled plans this week for a new Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics, focused on forecasts of disease outbreaks and analytics for public health.
The new center will be... Read More »
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) recently composed an Environmental Assessment draft regarding a New York City aerosol particle behavior study.
“This study is part of the Department’s ongoing commitment to public safety against the... Read More »
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) announced this week that it has launched the National Risk Index, designed to provide guidance regarding nationwide natural hazard risks.
Authorities indicated the resource also seeks to inform and educate communities as a means of helping to reduce the... Read More »
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced this week that it will award approximately $53 million in annual funding across the next five years to 10 research organizations currently pursuing HIV cure research.
“June marked the 40th anniversary of the first reported U.S. cases of what... Read More »
As part of a new agreement with Gritstone bio, Inc., the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) will provide up to $20.6 million to support the development of a new, self-amplifying mRNA vaccine candidate for the growing number of COVID-19 variants.
These funds will cover a... Read More »
A preclinical study conducted on non-human primates and published this week showed potential in a second-generation mRNA COVID-19 vaccine candidate, CV2CoV, created by the joint efforts of biopharmaceutical companies CureVac N.V. and GSK.
Among cynomolgus macaques, the new candidate -- an... Read More »
With diagnostic testing as important as ever in the battle to contain COVID-19, researchers from various institutions under the umbrella of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have banded together to create a new sample preparation method for detecting SARS-CoV-2.
The collaboration has... Read More »
The specialty vaccine firm Valneva SE has initiated a Phase 3 trial for its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, VLA2001.
VLA2001-304 seeks to generate data in the elderly and is designed to potentially enable variant-bridging through immune-comparability. Study data is slated to complement ongoing... Read More »
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has issued seven recommendations to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NSSA) regarding lithium activities.
The analysis and recommendations stem from NSSA facilities deteriorating and the agency proposing a new facility to meet lithium... Read More »
According to a new manuscript published in Science last week, the majority of people given Moderna Inc.’s COVID-19 vaccine maintained antibodies not just against SARS-CoV-2, but against many of its variants of concern, for six months after a second dose.
The two-dose vaccine has been... Read More »
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency recently selected three teams to support the Harnessing Enzymatic Activity for Lifesaving Remedies (HEALR) program.
The HEALR program, which bolsters chemical biology, medicinal chemistry, and microbiology expertise to transform the field of... Read More »
Groups of medical experts this week proposed a standardized definition for defining and evaluating placental SARS-CoV-2 infections to optimize both clinical care and new research, as well as the pursuit of COVID-19 vaccinations for pregnant individuals.
The first came from a panel of experts... Read More »
Regulatory approval was granted for two new clinical trials of INO-4800 in China this week, allowing its creator INOVIO and its partners Advaccine Biopharmaceuticals Suzhou Co. Ltd. and Sinovac Biotechnology to investigate the safety, tolerability, and immunogenicity of different... Read More »
