Platform to advance the large-scale production and purification of virus-like particles (VLPs) for use in cost-effective human vaccines

Sunflower Therapeutics (Sunflower), a public benefit corporation transforming global access to protein manufacturing capacity for diverse applications, today announced a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant of up to $2.36 million from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This two-phase grant begins with initial funding of $300,000, with further funds released upon achieving specific milestones. The funding will support Sunflower’s development of an automated, continuous cell disruption platform intended to significantly advance the large-scale production, separation and purification of VLPs for use in cost-effective human vaccines.

With this new funding, Sunflower will advance automated, continuous bioprocessing technologies to make production of VLPs, a proven vaccine platform, more efficient and affordable. Building on successful demonstrations of higher-yield VLP production using the Daisy Petal™ Perfusion Bioreactor System, Sunflower will now develop a fully continuous cell disruption platform to simplify VLP recovery, the dominant cost component of commercial VLP manufacturing.

"At Sunflower, our mission is to enable low-cost, next-generation vaccine manufacturing through continuous, automated bioprocessing," said Laura Crowell, Director of R&D at Sunflower Therapeutics. "This grant allows us to advance a groundbreaking unit operation for continuous cell disruption, an essential step toward efficient and cost-effective VLP manufacturing. We are proud to play an important role in strengthening the global vaccine ecosystem and ensuring critical technologies are accessible where they are needed most.”

There is an urgent need to improve VLP manufacturing to prevent vaccine shortages and lower production costs. VLPs are highly effective vaccine platforms, driving robust immune responses and already powering approved vaccines against hepatitis B, malaria, and human papillomavirus (HPV). Most VLP vaccines are produced in yeast, but conventional fed-batch systems continue to have high costs, limiting global access to these critical biologics, especially in the Global South. For example, HPV vaccines like Gardasil-9 have an approximate 41% uptake among adolescent girls in Africa, where HPV prevalence is nearly double that of other regions, largely due to their high cost. By combining high space-time yields with streamlined recovery, Sunflower’s approach has the potential to lower costs, expand access to life-saving vaccines, and enable decentralized manufacturing in small-footprint facilities worldwide.

The research is supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health under award number R44AI191984. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

To learn more about Sunflower’s accessible approach to bioprocessing, please visit sunflowertx.com.

About Sunflower Therapeutics

Sunflower Therapeutics is a unique biotech with a mission to transform bioeconomies worldwide by creating accessible solutions for protein product development and commercial manufacturing. Using our core technologies – an efficient host, data-driven methods for process development, and continuous biomanufacturing equipment – our team aims to democratize bioprocessing.

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