Aquilón experimental approach and value proposition

is driven by two key innovations that combine with breakthrough potential:

1
The use of short peptide antigenic determinants never described before, discovered by Aquilón’s scientist using a reactivity-driven systematic screening of the main envelope protein of the BVD virus, and
2
The use of VLP (Virus Like Particles) technology developed by VLPBio, a company located in Valladolid. VLPs are empty viral structures or capsids (without DNA) and hence they have no risk of virus replication. However, they mimic real viruses in that they can induce an immune response, humoral since they overexpose relevant epitopes from the original virus, and cellular due to their particulate nature that make them prone to induce this kind of response after dendritic cell and macrophages internalization and antigen presentation.
The main advantages of the Ch-VLP platform are:
Biosafety

VLPs mimic real viruses but they are not infectious avoiding the issues related to pathogen inactivation and simplifying vaccines security tests.

DIVA vaccine

DIVA is the coined acronym for Differentiating Infected from Vaccinated Animals, a key aspect in terms of disease management in livestock animals.

Vaccinated animals can be positively differentiated from infected animals using validated and cheap serological methods for the diagnostic of the poultry infectious bursal disease (IBD), or Gumboro disease, since the platform consists in inserting the antigenic sequences in the structural protein VP2 of the Gumboro virus, which has self-assembling properties thus allowing the formation of virus-like particles exposing the antigens of interest to the immune system.

On the other side, negative differentiation by the absence of antibodies against the protein p80 will be explored.

Diagnostic tests

Potential co-development of companion diagnostic tests (because of avian-specific Gumboro virus antigens)

High flexibility

Vaccines can be constituted by a formulation of different Ch-VLPs monocomponents displaying different antigens (cellular, humoral or both)

Synthetic antigenic consensus

Possibility to design synthetic antigenic consensus sequences covering different pathogen strains.

Low-cost production

Low-cost production system (yeast)