A global pandemic, scientific pledge of collaboration and transparency, and commercial, governmental, and non-governmental institutions respond to the crisis together. WHO, CEPI, CoVIC, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation have all taken center stage over the past year in the global fight against COVID-19. It was through science – virology, immunology, cellular immunology – and this worldwide collaborative effort that a vaccine was approved and made commercially available in 314 days. This webinar will pull back the curtain on partnering with the biopharmaceutical industry for vaccine development as a contract research organization.

Luc Gagnon, from Nexelis, and Bassam Hallis, from Public Health England, will reflect on the past year and their contribution to SARS-CoV-2. Speaking to the science behind vaccine development, the webinar will address the difference between a wild-type neutralization assay, the industry gold standard, and a surrogate pseudoparticle neutralization assay (PNA), how to generate a pseudoparticle, and the correlation studies performed to support adoption of the PNA assay for vaccine and antiviral development. Binding assays will also be explained, including the process optimized to generate key antigens used to assess the humoral response. The difference between the wild-type strains and the variants of concern (VOC) will also be highlighted, including how to assess the impact of these VOCs on the vaccine/drug efficacy.

Our team of scientists develop assays for use during all phases of vaccine development. In this webinar, they will detail the challenges, the scientific excellence needed to support this industry, and the proactive and scientifically sound approach that will become the gold standard for vaccines and antivirals assay development moving forward.

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