Initiative Seeks New Ways to Fight Disease

The Michigan Nanotechnology Institute for Medicine and Biological Sciences (M-NIMBS) at the University is one of 43 institutions to receive a Grand Challenges in Global Health Initiative grant funded largely by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The initiative seeks to achieve scientific breakthroughs against a number of diseases that kill millions of people each year in the world's poorest countries. The fund is supported by commitments of $450 million from the Gates Foundation, $27.1 million from the Wellcome Trust, and $4.5 million from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). The 43 grants total $436.6 million and were awarded for a broad range of innovative research projects involving scientists in 33 countries.

The $6.3-million Grand Challenges grant to M-NIMBS will support development and testing of a nanoemulsion-based vaccine delivery system that uses a simple nasal swab rather than an injection. The heat-stable system eliminates the need for vaccine refrigeration, which often is unavailable in developing countries.

"We believe this nanotechnology-based approach can revolutionize how vaccines are delivered and will be an important advance in the prevention of infectious diseases in developing countries," said Dr. James R. Baker, Jr., director of M-NIMBS and the study's lead investigator. "Nanoscale materials can penetrate the epidermis and mucosa, eliminating the need for needles and other inject able delivery systems."

The ultimate goal of the global health initiative is to create tools that are effective, inexpensive to produce, easy to distribute and simple to use. Of the billions spent each year on research into life-saving medicines, only a small fraction is focused on discovering and developing new tools to fight the diseases that cause millions of deaths each year in developing countries.

Visit www.umich.edu and www.grandchallengesgh.org.