Project description
A revolutionary refrigerator device for vaccine transportation
Nearly half of produced vaccines are wasted due to ineffective temperature maintenance during transportation. Safety hazard restrictions of refrigerants especially during aerial transport and issues with unreliable electricity supply in certain regions require us to revisit the vaccine cold chain. The EIC-funded MAGCCINE project aims to transform the vaccine cold chain by developing an innovative magnetocaloric refrigerator. This innovation essentially utilises a rotating magnetic field to induce temperature changes that can be harnessed for cooling purposes. The project’s goal is to create a fully operational prototype for maintaining vaccines at 2-8 °C, offering a green alternative to existing solutions at reduced cost.
Objective
Every year 1.5 million lives are lost worldwide due to insufficient access to vaccination while, paradoxically, over 50% of all produced vaccines are wasted, mostly due to ineffective temperature control during storage/transportation. The major challenges of the vaccine cold chain are the evermore strict limitations imposed on their aerial transport due to the safety hazards of refrigerant gases, the high-power demand of active refrigeration devices in last-mile deliveries where the electricity supply is unreliable, and the significant carbon footprint of high global warming potential refrigerants.
The Magccine project aims to revolutionize the vaccine cold chain by developing a clean and efficient solid state magnetic refrigerator based on a novel approach: the rotating magnetocaloric effect (RMCE) – a recently (2023) patent pending technology by project partners. By reducing the amount of permanent magnets required, the RMCE is expected to enable drastic cuts in the device’s production cost, volume and weight, while enhancing efficiency without the use of any high GWP or hazardous refrigerant gases, highlighting its role as a key enabling technology for tackling vaccine cold chain challenges. Magccine´s goal is to develop and optimize a fully operational prototype for vaccine refrigeration in the 2-8 ºC temperature range, which is required by most vaccines, addressing the Generation of clean cooling and clean cold chain transportation categories of this Challenge.
To this end, this project requires top-level expertise on magnetocaloric materials, magnetic field design, thermodynamic simulations and heat pumps which are perfectly matched by the complementary expertise of the five academic institutions (U.Porto CNRS, U. Seville, U.Aveiro U.Ljubljana) and the two industrial partners (MagREEsource, Helium 3). Our endeavors will be guided by an experienced advisory board including global key leaders such as WHO, UNICEF, Cemafroid, APIRAC, IIR, Medgree, and Addvolt.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- natural sciences chemical sciences inorganic chemistry noble gases
- engineering and technology mechanical engineering thermodynamic engineering
- medical and health sciences basic medicine pharmacology and pharmacy pharmaceutical drugs vaccines
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.3.1 - The European Innovation Council (EIC)
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
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Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) HORIZON-EIC-2023-PATHFINDERCHALLENGES-01
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
4099-002 Porto
Portugal
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.