NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) have launched a new joint initiative that will endeavour to make vaccines more resistant to heat, thus reducing the need for refrigeration. GSK and BMGF will invest a combined $1.8 million in early stage research into vaccine thermostability.

Most vaccines must be kept cold and transported under constant refrigeration via a so-called ‘cold chain’ which is a significant challenge in hot, remote and resource-limited regions.

Details of the Vaccine Discovery Partnership (VxDP) under which this initiative falls were unveiled this morning at the Foundation’s Grand Challenges Meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. In one of the first projects to start under this initiative, GSK researchers will explore how to make adjuvants – a critical component of some vaccines – more heat stable.