The following post was written and/or published as a collaboration between Benzinga’s in-house sponsored content team and a financial partner of Benzinga.

With the world eager to get the COVID-19 pandemic under control, the search for both vaccines and treatments has become a priority.

The virus continues to wreak havoc around the world, affecting every aspect of life. Unemployment is sky-high, economies are teetering on depression, and the common fear of the disease delays the return to life as we once knew it.

That is why many different companies and ventures are helping to find a solution to the global health emergency. Yet, we will require a massive production of vaccines at a low cost to distribute it affordably on a global basis. Thus, this desperate need for faster, cheaper biologic production pushes governments to pursue solutions apart from the private sector.

Dyadic International, Inc. (NASDAQ:DYAI) is a commercially proven gene expression company that has its roots in industrial biotechnology. The U.S., the EU, Israel, and other countries, government organizations, pharmaceutical, and biotech companies are collaborating with the company to find a possible solution and develop both the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidates and treatment through monoclonal antibodies.

Dyadic’s Gene Expression Systems

The COVID-19 pandemic has shed light on the pharmaceutical industry’s needs, governments, and citizens to evaluate disruptions in the manufacturing of biologic vaccines and drugs. Here’s where biotechnology such as Dyadic’s C1 comes to play a key role in COVID-19’s pharmaceutical response.

The company’s C1 Gene Expression platform has been re-engineered and can be used to manufacture biologic vaccines and drugs for years to come at more cost-effective and rapid speeds. The company aims to respond to the need for a COVID-19 vaccine by driving the adoption of its C1 platform.

Dyadic discovered a unique and highly expressive fungal host through their work in developing a gene expression system for producing enzymes used for a variety of industrial uses including biofuels. These discoveries and improvements led the company’s C1 Gene Expression Platform. Over the years, C1 has gained recognition in industrial biotechnology, winning business with customers and licensees such as Abengoa S.A. (NASDAQ:ABGOF), du Pont (NYSE:DD), BASF SE (NASDAQ:BFFAF), and Royal Dutch Shell Plc (NASDAQ:RYDAF).

Over the past two decades, C1 technology has been developed into a next-generation protein expression. C1’s ability to produce high-quality enzymes at high yields and purity made the C1 technology a well-regarded expression platform used in many industrial applications. All of this led to the sale of Dyadic’s Industrial Biotechnology business to DuPont back in December 2015 for $75 million.

Dyadic And ZAPI: Research And Collaboration

Back in 2015, the EU funded the IMI Zoonotic Anticipation Preparedness Initiative (ZAPI). Through it, several well-known production platforms were extensively evaluated and only Dyadic’s C1 gene expression platform was chosen as the ideal cell line that could rapidly produce difficult to express antigens at low costs and in large amounts to help protect against potential outbreaks. The company developed the SARS-CoV-2 RBD vaccine candidate in collaboration with the IIBR and three of the top coronavirus scientists from ZAPI.

Through this collaboration, which started earlier this year when the pandemic surfaced, a stable C1 cell line was rapidly generated. The results demonstrated that the C1 SARS-CoV-2 could be one of the most successful vaccine producers against COVID-19 since it enables rapid low-cost production of potentially billions of vaccine doses. Its C1 technology has been designed to be compatible with existing manufacturing facilities globally.

The Quest For A Solution

In addition to vaccines, C1 has the potential to produce monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) in high amounts more rapidly than using CHO (Chinese Hamster Ovaries) cells or other production methods. This allows for more rapid manufacturing of greater amounts of lower-cost mAbs to treat diseases including COVID-19.

European governments, Israel, and now the United States are all working with C1 to accelerate their vaccine development programs. Up to 10 global animal trials are to be completed by early Q1 of 2021 making it a total of 9 different parties using Dyadic’s COVID-19 vaccine candidates. Samples have been sent to Frederick National Laboratories for their evaluation. A SARS-CoV-2 monoclonal antibody (mAb) in collaboration with IDBiologics Inc has been expressed. Dyadic is also in discussions with other parties to express additional COVID-19 mAbs, vaccines, and diagnostics proteins.

To learn more about Dyadic, click here.

Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

The preceding post was written and/or published as a collaboration between Benzinga’s in-house sponsored content team and a financial partner of Benzinga. Although the piece is not and should not be construed as editorial content, the sponsored content team works to ensure that any and all information contained within is true and accurate to the best of their knowledge and research. This content is for informational purposes only and not intended to be investing advice.

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