Imperial College London Begins First Human Trials of New Self-Amplifying RNA COVID-19 Vaccine

This will also be the first test of a new self-amplifying RNA technology, which has the potential to revolutionize vaccine development and enable scientists to respond more quickly to emerging diseases. The vaccine has undergone rigorous pre-clinical safety tests and has been shown to be safe with encouraging signs of an effective immune response in animal studies. Ultimately, the researchers hope that if clinical trials are successful, the vaccine could provide protection against COVID-19 both in the UK and around the world.

The Imperial vaccine is based on a new approach which uses synthetic strands of genetic code (called RNA), based on the virus’s genetic material. Once injected into muscle, the RNA self amplifies, or generates copies of itself, and instructs the body’s own cells to make copies of a spiky protein found on the outside of the virus. This should train the immune system to respond to the coronavirus so the body can easily recognize it and defend itself against COVID-19 in future.

Over the coming weeks, 300 healthy participants will receive two doses of the vaccine. If the vaccine is safe and shows a promising immune response in humans, then larger Phase III trials would be planned to begin later in the year with around 6,000 healthy volunteers to test its effectiveness. The researchers expect to publish findings once the safety data are available and are hopeful a viable vaccine could be available as early as spring 2021.

“From a scientific perspective, new technologies mean we have been able to get moving on a potential vaccine with unprecedented speed,” said Professor Robin Shattock from the Department of Infectious Disease at Imperial who is leading the work. We’ve been able to produce a vaccine from scratch and take it to human trials in just a few months, from code to candidate, which has never been done before with this type of vaccine. If our approach works and the vaccine provides effective protection against disease, it could revolutionize how we respond to disease outbreaks in future.”

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