SZIRAK: In an unassuming house in the hills east of the Hungarian capital, a small family business is helping grease the wheels of the world’s big pharmaceutical companies on the road to a coronavirus vaccine.
Biologist Noemi Lukacs, 71, retired to Szirak, her hometown, to establish English & Scientific Consulting (SciCons) and manufacture a genetic sensor so sensitive that a few grams can supply the entire world industry for a year.
“We produce monoclonal antibodies,” Lukacs told Reuters in the one-story house where he was born, now partly converted into a world-class laboratory. White powder is shipped around the world from here, micrograms at a time.
“These antibodies recognize double-stranded RNA (dsRNA),” he explained. DsRNA is a by-product of virus replication, so its presence indicates the presence of a live virus, long useful in virus-related research.
More importantly, dsRNA is also a by-product of the process used by US giant Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech to create their experimental Covid-19 vaccine, which is more than 90% effective based on results from last week’s initial trial.
And because dsRNA can be harmful to human cells, it must be filtered from any vaccine used in humans. There are several filtering methods, but the most commonly used way to perform quality control is to expose the vaccine to Lukacs antibodies.
The antibodies will not only show if there is dsRNA in the vaccine, but they will also tell researchers how much is present. Only after the dsRNA has been completely released can the vaccine be administered.
The result: a line of representatives from Big Pharma outside your door.
The small business is growing rapidly, but its revenue was just 124 million guilders (a little over $ 400,000) last year, with profit of 52 million guilders. That feeds five employees and even leaves some for local charitable projects in Szirak.
For Lukacs, that’s fine. The long-frowned success of the RNA field is a sufficient claim.
The former university professor closely followed the race to the vaccine and took particular root in the contestants who seem ready to come first: those who use modified RNA to train the cells of the human body to recognize and kill the coronavirus. RNA was his dog on the run.
The modified RNA methodology, or mRNA, is an entirely new group of drugs, with the Covid vaccine being the first product likely to gain regulatory approval and go into mass production. But more applications are expected, which has delighted Lukacs.
“Once you get into the RNA field, it is an extremely exciting area,” he said, recalling decades of struggles when the rest of the scientific community did not share his enthusiasm.
Or most of the rest, that is. Another Hungarian woman, Katalin Kariko, who works across the Atlantic, patented the method that allows the use of RNA and promises to rid the world not only of the coronavirus, but of many other diseases.
In the process, Kariko, now vice president of Germany’s BioNTech, which was the first along with US giant Pfizer to break through with a vaccine earlier this month, became one of SciCons’ first customers.
Advancing Covid and other RNA uses may also require increased use of Lukacs’s antibodies, but they don’t anticipate much help.
“We would be happy to sell more,” said Johanna Symmons, her daughter and CEO of the small business. “We probably will too. But it’s not like we’re getting rich dumb.”
Being part of the solution reaps its own rewards.
“We have cooperated with most of the vaccine manufacturers and certainly almost all of those who use the mRNA method,” he said with a touch of pride. “We have been a small screw in this great machine.”
Biologist Noemi Lukacs, 71, retired to Szirak, her hometown, to establish English & Scientific Consulting (SciCons) and manufacture a genetic sensor so sensitive that a few grams can supply the entire world industry for a year.
“We produce monoclonal antibodies,” Lukacs told Reuters in the one-story house where he was born, now partly converted into a world-class laboratory. White powder is shipped around the world from here, micrograms at a time.
“These antibodies recognize double-stranded RNA (dsRNA),” he explained. DsRNA is a by-product of virus replication, so its presence indicates the presence of a live virus, long useful in virus-related research.
More importantly, dsRNA is also a by-product of the process used by US giant Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech to create their experimental Covid-19 vaccine, which is more than 90% effective based on results from last week’s initial trial.
And because dsRNA can be harmful to human cells, it must be filtered from any vaccine used in humans. There are several filtering methods, but the most commonly used way to perform quality control is to expose the vaccine to Lukacs antibodies.
The antibodies will not only show if there is dsRNA in the vaccine, but they will also tell researchers how much is present. Only after the dsRNA has been completely released can the vaccine be administered.
The result: a line of representatives from Big Pharma outside your door.
The small business is growing rapidly, but its revenue was just 124 million guilders (a little over $ 400,000) last year, with profit of 52 million guilders. That feeds five employees and even leaves some for local charitable projects in Szirak.
For Lukacs, that’s fine. The long-frowned success of the RNA field is a sufficient claim.
The former university professor closely followed the race to the vaccine and took particular root in the contestants who seem ready to come first: those who use modified RNA to train the cells of the human body to recognize and kill the coronavirus. RNA was his dog on the run.
The modified RNA methodology, or mRNA, is an entirely new group of drugs, with the Covid vaccine being the first product likely to gain regulatory approval and go into mass production. But more applications are expected, which has delighted Lukacs.
“Once you get into the RNA field, it is an extremely exciting area,” he said, recalling decades of struggles when the rest of the scientific community did not share his enthusiasm.
Or most of the rest, that is. Another Hungarian woman, Katalin Kariko, who works across the Atlantic, patented the method that allows the use of RNA and promises to rid the world not only of the coronavirus, but of many other diseases.
In the process, Kariko, now vice president of Germany’s BioNTech, which was the first along with US giant Pfizer to break through with a vaccine earlier this month, became one of SciCons’ first customers.
Advancing Covid and other RNA uses may also require increased use of Lukacs’s antibodies, but they don’t anticipate much help.
“We would be happy to sell more,” said Johanna Symmons, her daughter and CEO of the small business. “We probably will too. But it’s not like we’re getting rich dumb.”
Being part of the solution reaps its own rewards.
“We have cooperated with most of the vaccine manufacturers and certainly almost all of those who use the mRNA method,” he said with a touch of pride. “We have been a small screw in this great machine.”
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