Summary:
The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) seeks research co-development partners and/or licensees for clinical validation and to further develop the technology.
Description of Technology:
This invention is a potential subcutaneous or intramuscular progestin-only, injectable contraceptive for women. Forty-five percent (45%) of pregnancies in the United States are unintended. In this group, one-third of reproductive age women are obese – increasing the risk of diabetes, hypertension and venous thromboembolism (VTE). All these are conditions for which most hormonal methods are contraindicated. Thus, additional safe and effective injectable contraceptive options are needed.
The baculovirus-based protein expression system has gained increased prominence as a method for expressing recombinant proteins that are used in a wide range of biomedical applications. An important step in the use of this system is the ability to determine the virus infectious titer, i.e., the number of active baculovirus particles produced during an infection of the insect host cell.
Baculoviruses have been used for decades to produce proteins in insect cell hosts. Current systems for generating recombinant baculovirus have several shortcomings which prevent their easy use in high-throughput applications.
In collaboration with surgery specialists from Johns Hopkins University, researchers at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) developed novel hydrogel compositions and methods of using them in the microsurgical suturing of blood vessels, which is particularly beneficial for surgeons in whole tissue transplant procedures. The lead candidate electropositive hydrogels, called APC1, was demonstrated in anastomosis mice models to be well tolerated, biocompatible, and non-toxic.
This technology includes a new class of nanobody–antiviral peptide conjugates that block HIV from infecting human CD4⁺ T-cells, positioning them for future therapeutic and prophylactic use. Nanobodies—single-domain antibody fragments—guide the drug to the virus’s docking site and impede receptor binding, while the linked peptide halts the membrane-fusion step, creating a one-two punch against viral entry.
