Tobacco Development and Preparation of New Coronavirus Vaccine! Thai Startups Break New Technology Lines

According to a report from Thailand’s 'Sing Siam Daily', Dr. Thirakwa and Professor, Director of the New Infectious Disease Science Center of Chulalongkorn Hospital of the Thai Red Cross, revealed that the reorganization of plants jointly developed by the center and a Thai start-up company. The vaccine protein has been tested in mice and monkeys, and both have achieved satisfactory results, but there is currently a lack of government support. He introduced that the recombinant protein vaccine and mRNA vaccine promoted by the group belong to different technical routes. They are extracted from non-smoking tobacco and are complete proteins that can be used immediately.

Professor Thiratwa introduced that the recombinant vaccine was jointly promoted by the Thai start-up Baiya Phytopharm and the Emerging Infectious Disease Science Center of Chulalongkorn Hospital School of Medicine. The tobacco leaves used are not used to produce cigarettes. The research team used the method of extracting plant protein to prepare the vaccine, and researched another mRNA technology route in China (Note: This research is also led by the Jura University School of Medicine, and is currently preparing the entry stage of human experimentation, but because the list of foreign factories producing prototype vaccines is full, human experiments have been announced.) The difference is that the vaccine raised from tobacco leaves is a complete protein and can react immediately after being injected into the human body. After the mRNA vaccine is injected into the human body, it must use cells to produce protein and then stimulate the antibody response. Tobacco vaccines have been tested in mice and monkeys. After the two doses of vaccine were injected at an interval of 3 weeks, antibody responses were generated in the cells and serum.

Professor Thirawa said that testing and developing vaccines from plant proteins has also brought benefits to the use of plant proteins to treat confirmed cases of new coronary pneumonia. More importantly, this technical circuit is completely developed by the Thai team and has no foreign patent transfer issues. Next, the vaccine will enter the human experiment stage, but it will also encounter the problem that the prototype vaccine production plant cannot be queued. Therefore, if the government can provide support to help find vaccine co-production, it is expected that the vaccine human experiment of this line can also start the dome within 3 months. However, if the factory cannot be contacted and the vaccine co-production can be built by itself, it is estimated that it will take at least 9 months to complete .

Professor Thirawa said that experiments using the protein contained in tobacco leaves to develop vaccines have been around the world for 15-20 years, and the Ebola virus vaccine has been successfully put into use and played an important role in disease prevention. The R&D project in Thailand is jointly carried out by a domestic start-up company and the School of Pharmacy of Jura University, and has received funding from Jura alumni, but has not yet received support from the government.