Project description
Safe and affordable antivenoms on the horizon
Venomous snakebites affect 2.5 million and kill around 100 000 people each year. Conventional antivenoms often cause severe side effects and anaphylaxis in patients and are costly to manufacture. The EU-funded MABSTER project will develop a cost-effective approach to identify and engineer human monoclonal antibodies with special toxin-binding properties making them sensitive to regulation by the microenvironment (e.g. pH). Project research will harness phage display selection, high-density peptide microarray technology, and antibody engineering methods to discover and develop human monoclonal antibodies that are broadly cross-reactive, enabling them to neutralise several different venom toxins at the same time. Successful outcome of the project might generate new ways to design biotherapeutics for other complex indications, such as cancer as well as infectious and parasitic diseases.
Objective
Snakebite envenoming is a Neglected Tropical Disease (NTD) that each year affects 2.5 million victims and kills >100,000, unless they are treated with antivenom. Conventional antivenoms, derived from immunized animals, inflict serum sickness and anaphylaxis in patients, and are costly to manufacture. Monoclonal human antibodies with special toxin-binding properties that are sensitive towards regulation by their microenvironment (e.g. pH), which may be discovered using phage display selection, may solve this issue, providing significant societal impact by enabling the development of cost-effective antivenoms to victims in low and middle-income countries. In this project, phage display selection, high-density peptide microarray technology, and antibody engineering techniques will in three scientific objectives be harnessed in the pursuit of developing novel methodologies for discovery of therapeutic human monoclonal antibodies that are recyclable (can neutralize more than one snake toxin per antibody), broadly cross-reactive (can neutralize different types of snake toxins), and that are both broadly cross-reactive and recyclable at the same time. This will open up for entirely new ways of designing biotherapeutics against complex indications, such snakebite envenoming, but also cancer, infectious, and parasitic diseases, where the targets can be elusive due to hyper-mutability. The ERC Starting Grant offers a unique opportunity to consolidate me as an international key scientific researcher in this field of antibody discovery and NTDs. I have already independently led a research group in this area for 2 years, I have in-depth experience with toxin-targeted antibody discovery (my dr.tech dissertation similar to the German “habilitation” will be submitted during fall 2018), and I am already involved in high level policy in the field of snakebite envenoming via my role as a scientific advisor for the World Health Organization.
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 biological sciences biochemistry biomolecules
- medical and health sciences clinical medicine oncology
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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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H2020-EU.1.1. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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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
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.
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.
ERC-STG - Starting Grant
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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) ERC-2019-STG
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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.
2800 KONGENS LYNGBY
Denmark
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.