Researchers at London's Western University are joining the front lines of the effort to combat the spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19).
The university announced on Thursday that a "multidisciplinary team" of researchers is quickly beginning work on the development of an effective vaccine for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.
“An effective vaccine will have a tremendous impact on stopping the spread of the virus or alleviating the symptoms of the disease in infected individuals,” said Stephen Barr, Ph.D., associate professor at Schulich Medicine & Dentistry, in a news release.
The team consists of experts in virology, microbiology, vaccinology, bioinformatics and immunology, and will be building off work that was started by Chil-Yong Kang, Ph.D., a professor emeritus at Schulich Medicine & Dentistry. Kang has been working on for a vaccine for Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, which is caused by a class of coronavirus similar to what causes COVID-19.
“In the face of an outbreak like this one, putting together collaborative teams and working with other labs across the country is critically important for giving Canada the greatest chance to effectively control and manage this pandemic," said Barr.
The university said its researchers are able to safely study the virus with the state-of-the-art imaging equipment at Western's recently constructed Imaging Pathogens for Knowledge Translation (ImPaKT) facility. ImPaKT also contains Canada’s newest Containment Level 3 facility.
The team will also be working to develop a "vaccine bank" that would contain many ready-made vaccines should another coronavirus outbreak of a different strain occur in the future.
The team at Western has received $998,840 in funding for the project from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. The funding was announced on Thursday and Western's project is one of 96 that has received funding as part of a Canadian response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has caused more than 9,000 deaths worldwide.
“With the emergence of a new virus in the human population, we don’t know what will work to control or treat it,” said Barr. “By sharing the knowledge we all get from across Canada, we can rapidly develop a variety of vaccines that can help stop and or slow the outbreak.”