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Abera has an extensive portfolio of pre-clinical vaccine projects
Abera’s vaccine delivery platform works as a plug-and-play system where known or novel antigens can be engineered onto our delivery platform to create effective, multivalent vaccines that are cost-effective and fast to produce.
The lead vaccine candidate is a universal pneumococcal vaccine candidate Ab-01.12, based on the platform BERA. In difference from existing vaccine, Ab-01.12 targets all variants of the bacteria and is given as a nasal spray resulting in a mucosal and system immune response. Initial clinical trials are planned to early 2024 in a collaboration with Radboud UMC.
Abera explores applications of their technologies within the immune oncology field and has promising pre-clinical development within personalized therapeutic cancer vaccines.
Abera actively work together with academia and industry to enable the use of our vaccine delivery platform in design and development of new vaccines. Many of these projects are supported by grants from governments, EU and non-profit health organizations. Collaborative projects include the development of vaccine candidates against Chlamydia, Covid-19 and ETEC. We are actively seeking broader partnerships to advance these efforts as well as novel ideas.
Infections caused by the bacterium Streptococcus pneumoniae (pneumococcus) are a major cause of morbidity and mortality all over the world, especially for children under 5 years of age and elderly people. It is estimated that 1.5 to 2 million people die of pneumococcal disease every year. According to WHO, over 14.5 millions of severe cases occur in children under 5 years and cause over 800,000 deaths each year.
Pneumococcal disease exists in different forms and can create severe symptoms such as sepsis, meningitis, and bacterial pneumonia. Less severe symptoms include middle ear infections, sinusitis, and bronchitis. Today, 144 countries have pneumococcal vaccines in their children vaccination programs. More and more countries also recommend pneumococcal vaccination to people over 65 years. During 2019, the revenue of the market leading vaccine was over 6,000 mUSD.
More than 97 different serotypes of the pneumococcus bacterium have been identified throughout the world. However, current vaccines only cover a limited number of serotypes (13, 20 and 23). These were causing most of the severe disease cases at the time of development. Unfortunately, over the years serotype replacement occurs, which means that serotypes not covered by the vaccine become more prevalent and form a new threat of infection. Increasing problems with antibiotic resistance when treating pneumococcal disease also increase the need for a new generation of pneumococcal vaccines that give a broader scope of protection.
Current vaccines on the market are based on serotype-specific polysaccharides. Abera on the other hand uses novel and highly conserved surface protein antigens that are present among all known serotypes. This enables us to design a universal pneumococcal vaccine.
The current pneumococcal vaccines are expensive to produce due to their complex manufacturing process. Most cases of child deaths caused by pneumococcal disease occur in developing countries highlighting the need for vaccines that are cost-effective to produce and simple to administer – criteria that Abera’s vaccine candidate and platform meet.
Cancer is a disease caused by an uncontrolled division of cells in a part of the body. It is the second most common cause for deaths in the world. Last year, over 10 million people died due to cancer and this number is expected to increase to 24 million by 2035.
Immunotherapies and therapeutic vaccines aim to combat existing disease and to trigger and exploit the body’s own immune system against the cancer cells. Abera’s technology platform has numerous and diverse opportunities in the field of immuno-oncology of which a handful of leads are being investigated together with partners.
Currently Abera focus on the proof-of-concept for a personalised therapeutic vaccine based on neo-antigens. Neo-antigens are tumour-unique mutations and a promising target in the future of cancer treatment.
Abera’s vaccine delivery platform works as a plug-and-play system where known or novel antigens can be engineered onto our delivery platform to create effective, multivalent vaccines that are cost-effective and fast to produce.
We have a pipeline of pre-clinical vaccine candidates within Chlamydia, Covid-19, Tuberculosis and ETEC and prepare the platform for pandemic preparedness purposes. We are actively seeking broader partnerships to advance these efforts or novel ideas.
We actively work together with academia and industry to enable the use of our vaccine delivery platform in design and development of new vaccines. Many of these projects are carried out in collaborations and are supported by grants from governments, EU and non-profit health organizations.
Get in contact with us via the contact form or email: info@aberabio.com
Abera Bioscience is a platform and vaccine development company based on over 30 years of research in the medical, molecular and microbiological field. Abera was founded in 2012 as a spin-out from the Swedish protein production company Xbrane Bioscience.