Project description
Greener production of next-generation medicines
Modified nucleic acids used as therapeutics and mRNA vaccines offer a new, powerful way to treat various diseases including cancer, neurological disorders and infections. However, current manufacturing methods are slow, costly and require extensive resources. Moreover, they are difficult to scale, limiting wider access to these treatments. With the support of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the OLIGNA project aims to develop a cleaner and more flexible enzymatic method for building modified nucleic acids. Instead of relying on traditional chemical synthesis, researchers will engineer specialised enzymes that assemble nucleic acids with high precision and add medically important chemical modifications. This approach has the potential to improve sustainability and lower production costs of nucleic acid therapeutics.
Objective
Modified nucleic acids including antisense oligonucleotides and siRNAs are set to transform medicine. Currently there are 18 approved drugs, and over 150 modified nucleic acid therapeutics currently in clinical trials for the treatment of cancer, cardiovascular, and neurodegenerative conditions as well as other diseases. The mRNA vaccines used to combat COVID-19 and related cancer vaccines also comprise of modified mRNA with alternative nucleobases. In addition, modified nucleic acids are widely used in basic research (structure-function studies). Currently, nucleic acids are mainly produced by outdated solid-phase synthesis (SPS), which requires many steps per cycle and is highly atom inefficient, using expensive monomers, deleterious reagents and large amounts of organic solvents. Such methods are very difficult to scale up and create a huge amount of waste which has hampered drug production. Longer modified mRNA vaccines can be produced using template-dependant polymerase enzymes, but this limits the extent to which modifications can be included. In OLIGNA I aim to overcome these limitations and deliver an alternative template independent enzymatic approach for the synthesis of modified nucleic acids which is more sustainable than SPS, in addition to being more versatile than existing enzymatic approaches. The project is comprised of three work packages: WP1 aims to engineer orthogonal ligases enzymes to insert modified nucleotide monomers between two RNA strands to generate longer site-specifically labelled RNAs for structure-functional studies; WP2 will explore developing the orthogonal ligases for the iterative assembly of native RNA; WP3 aims to further engineer the ligases to accept modified nucleotide and dinucleotide precursors including the common 2´-sugar modifications required for the production of nucleic acid therapeutics. OLIGNA will deliver game-changing technology to transform nucleic acid synthesis, providing new research tools and medicines.
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.
- medical and health sciences basic medicine pharmacology and pharmacy pharmaceutical drugs vaccines
- medical and health sciences clinical medicine oncology
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics RNA
- natural sciences biological sciences biochemistry biomolecules proteins enzymes
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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.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
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.
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.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
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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-MSCA-2025-PF
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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.
SW7 2AZ London
United Kingdom
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.