Vaccine firm names new CEO

Canberra vaccine developer Vaxine has appointed Ted Stapinski, a 20-year veteran of Australia's space industry, as its new CEO.

Stapinski, who set up successful space-engineering company Auspace as an Australian National University spin-off in 1986, will still be commercialising ANU research in his new role, only this time from the John Curtin School of Medical Research.

Based at Canberra Hospital, Vaxine is developing a suite of prophylactic and therapeutic vaccines for hepatitis B, type 1 diabetes, malaria, gastrointestinal cancers and other serious illnesses.

The company is boosting its vaccines with a potent new adjuvant, ADVAX, developed by now-retired JCSMR researcher Dr Peter Cooper.

The active ingredient in the adjuvant is inulin, which Cooper -- now a consultant to Vaxine -- purified from dahlia tubers. He initially tested it as a potential chemotherapeutic agent for cancer, but found its most promising activity was as an adjuvant.

Stapinski said inulin had two vital attributes for an adjuvant: it is virtually non-toxic, and induces both and cytotoxic T cell- and antibody-mediated immunity. Vaxine researchers have modified inulin to increase its potency.

Stapinski said Vaxine planned to take its first vaccine into human trials later this year -- a hepatitis B vaccine that would require only two doses, rather than the three doses of current hepatitis B vaccines.

The experimental vaccine's induction of cytotoxic immunity makes it a promising candidate as a therapeutic, because of its ability to eliminate liver cells chronically infected by the hepatitis B virus.

ADVAX's ability to boost T-cell immunity makes it an attractive candidate as an adjuvant for therapeutic vaccines for cancer.

Stapinksi said the type 1 diabetes vaccine was still at the early development stage, but has been shown to be protective in a mouse model.

The company's malaria vaccine has also shown to be protective in mice. Stapinski said Vaxine researchers had identified a promising antigen in the malaria parasite, and were now working to characterise its most immunogenic epitopes for use in a sub-unit vaccine.