The team envisions that the method's freeze-dried components could be carried in portable kits for use in the field anywhere in the world.
The team of researchers at Harvard's Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering has been working on a molecular manufacturing method that can produce a broad range of biomolecules, including vaccines, antimicrobial peptides and antibody conjugates, anywhere in the world, without power or refrigeration.
Recently, the team has unveiled what they set out to deliver, a "just add water" portable method that affordably, rapidly, and precisely generates compounds that could be administered as therapies or used in experiments and diagnostics.
The approach, called "portable biomolecular manufacturing" by Collins' team, which also included Neel Joshi, Ph.D., a Wyss Core Faculty member and Associate Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Harvard's John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), hinges on the idea that freeze-dried pellets containing "molecular machinery" can be mixed and matched to achieve a wide variety of end-products. By simply adding water, this molecular machinery can be set in motion.
The cost of the approach, at roughly three cents per microliter, could also give access to biomolecular manufacturing to researchers and educators who lack access to wet labs and other sophisticated equipment, impacting basic science beyond the immediately apparent promise in clinical applications.
"The ability to synthesize and administer biomolecular compounds, anywhere, could undoubtedly shift the reach of medicine and science across the world," said Wyss Core Faculty member James Collins, Ph.D., senior author on the study, who is also Professor of Medical Engineering & Science and Professor of Biological Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)'s Department of Biological Engineering. "Our goal is make biomolecular manufacturing accessible wherever it could improve lives."
The World Health Organization stated that one half of the global population lives in rural areas. And according to UNICEF, last year nearly 20 million infants globally did not receive what we would consider to be basic vaccinations required for a child's health.
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