Discovery and Basic Research
.jpg "Sharon Vijayanand, B. Pharm photo")
Sharon Vijayanand, B. Pharm
Ph.D. Candidate
Mercer University
Atlanta, Georgia
Smital R. Patil, Bachelor of Pharmacy
Ph.D Candidate
Mercer University College of Pharmacy
Atlanta, Georgia
Satish Singh
Vice President
Moderna Therapeutics
This session will present a forum to discuss learnings from current experience with the various vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 and novel vaccination strategies to improve vaccine efficacy. This includes addressing the current challenges in COVID-19 vaccine development, shortcomings of existing vaccines, introducing novel formulation approaches such as polymeric microparticles as antigen carriers, and using pain-free technologies such as microneedles for vaccine administration.
Pain-free vaccination strategies such as microneedles, dissolving films for buccal vaccination, and intranasal vaccines can greatly improve the vaccination rate and have several advantages when compared to conventional vaccination routes such as intramuscular and subcutaneous injections. The presentation will discuss the responses obtained by vaccination with the aforementioned pain-free strategies and will highlight the effectiveness of the same.
The speakers will also discuss the advantage of using different structural proteins such as spike and nucleoprotein of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in combination to generate an effective immune response. Combination vaccines can be an effective way to reduce frequent immunizations, thereby promoting patient compliance. The session will also introduce the concept of a combination vaccine for COVID-19 and Influenza and will discuss the responses generated by the vaccine when administered as pain-free buccal films.
This presentation is being proposed by the AAPS student community and early-career scientists in collaboration with senior career scientists as mentors and endorsed by the therapeutic product immunogenicity community and PDPD community.