NEW DELHI: The Union science and technology ministry will fund a Pune-based firm to develop a

for Covid-19 which is expected to enter phase-1 trial in 18-20 months. Seagull Biosolutions is the first company the government is financially backing for

vaccine efforts. It will also produce at-home test kits for Covid-19 that can detect even asymptomatic infections.

For both purposes, Seagull will use its existing Active

(AVT) which can develop novel Active Virosome agents to induce antibodies. The firm is developing two kinds of agents to produce 19 types of neutralising

to fight the new coronavirus. While the first agent will express the S protein — which mediates attachment of the virus to the host cell surface receptors — the other will express structural proteins of Covid-19.

The company, enrolled with the Union ministry under its Seed Support System scheme with the Technology Development Board, will conduct tests on wild mice to check efficacy of the two AV agents. The next round of tests would be on mice models of SARS disease and later on monkeys or another small animal. The AV-vaccine agent will then be prepared for phase-1 clinical trials.

Vishwas Joshi, founder and MD of the firm, told TOI that the vaccine could be fast-tracked if clearances for animal testing are given on time. Joshi also said their AVT platform has previously been used to develop vaccines for ebola, zika, chikungunya and dengue. “For coronavirus, we will evaluate the ability of AV agents to induce anti-Covid-19 neutralising antibodies and cellular immune responses,” he said.

The same AV agents are also being used by the firm to develop at-home test kits for Covid-19. The currently available polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based diagnostic kits can detect active infections but cannot identify asymptomatic infections. In contrast, immunodiagnostic kits developed by the firm will detect antibodies to Covid-19 and, thus, identify asymptomatic infections too.

Department of science and technology (DST) secretary

said the firm will help in diagnostics to break the chain of transmission as well as develop preventive measures, including safe and effective vaccines.

The department has earmarked Rs 56 crore for start-ups working on Covid-19 solutions under its ‘Centre for Augmenting WAR with Covid-19 Health Crisis (CAWACH)’ programme.