Altimmune has announced that a study of its AdCOVID intranasal vaccine candidate induced a strong immune response in a mouse model. The results support advancing AdCOVID into a Phase 1 development, the company said, and it plans to begin manufacturing the vaccine for a trial in the fourth quarter of this year. The company recently said that it has partnered with DynPort Vaccine to obtain funding for development of the vaccine.
The company is also partnered with the University of Alabama Birmingham (UAB), which conducted preclinical tests of AdCOVID. According to the company, mice receiving a single dose of AdCOVID administered intranasally in one study had serum IgG antibody concentrations higher than 800 mcg/ml at 14 days post administration. The single dose of AdCOVID also resulted serum virus neutralization titers at 28 days post administration that were twice as high as that recommended for investigational convalescent plasma. Another study found stimulation of mucosal IgA response in mouse bronchoalveolar fluid at a level “well above that associated with protection from disease in clinical studies of other mucosal vaccines.”
UAB professor Frances Lund, the lead investigator, said, “Stimulation of immunity at this level just 14 days after a single dose is impressive for any vaccine, and is particularly notable for a potential coronavirus vaccine. The potent stimulation of mucosal IgA immunity in the respiratory tract may be crucial to effectively block infection and transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus given that the nasal cavity is a key point of entry and replication for the SARS-CoV-2 virus.”
Read the Altimmune press release.
