Bio-pharmaceutical company Lipoxen PLC (AIM: LPX) said it has received funding and US government endorsement for trialling its ImuXen technology to enhance the performance of malaria vaccine candidates.
The PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, a program of the non-profit organization, PATH, will provide funding for the project. Scientists from the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), a component of the US National Institutes of Health, will provide expertise to the project, which is anticipated to report results in mid-2010.
ImuXen is a group of patented liposomal technologies designed to improve the delivery and effectiveness of DNA, protein and polysaccharide vaccines.
The project will apply Lipoxen's technology with a view to improving the ultimate performance and efficacy of malaria vaccines. Lipoxen will be responsible for the development of an optimised malaria vaccine formulation, while NIAID scientists will be responsible for evaluating its activity in a relevant pre-clinical model.
Lipoxen's proprietary ImuXen technology is based on the use of natural substances found in the human body (liposomes) to entrap the active ingredients - a malaria antigen in this project - to ensure their direct delivery to the appropriate cells of the immune system, thereby enhancing the effectiveness of vaccines.