News & Insights

Antibody Solutions Secures Grant for Challenging Diagnostic Initiative 

Project will seek to generate more sensitive antibodies to improve the quality of diagnostic tests for malaria 

SANTA CLARA, CA (April 4th, 2024) – Antibody Solutions, a leading provider of fit-for-purpose antibody discovery services, announced today that it received a 15-month grant for nearly $1.2 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop reagents for highly-specified rapid diagnostic tests (RDT) to detect malaria.

“One challenge with some reagents in current RDTs for malaria is their lack of specificity, sensitivity, and suitability. The end result is that those RDTs are unable to differentiate between different species of malaria,” explained John Kenney, PhD, co-founder and president of Antibody Solutions. “When you’re marshaling limited resources to respond quickly to a deadly infectious disease, the more accurate your diagnostic tools, the better your response. ”

Antibody Solutions has already begun work to identify these new antibody reagents by harnessing Cellestive, its antibody discovery platform, that includes multiple discovery pathways such as hybridoma library, primary B-cell screening, and guided next-generation sequencing (NGS). Such a comprehensive approach is typically only selected by drug developers pursuing therapeutic candidates; budget and timeline constraints put the pursuit of multiple simultaneous discovery paths out of reach for most diagnostic reagent discovery projects. With support from the Gates Foundation, the Antibody Solutions team can avoid that hurdle and focus on discovering better reagents to the target of interest (plasmodium lactate dehydrogenase protein, or pLDH) by approaching it as they would a traditional therapeutic target.

In October, Antibody Solutions was proud to take part in the annual Festival of Biologics (FoB) in Basel, Switzerland. While our team is no stranger to international conferences, this was our first since the start of the SARS-Cov-2 pandemic in early 2020. So it was a special treat to spend three days catching up with colleagues from around the world. 

A strategic approach to peptide design yields success

When deciding which antigens to use for an antibody discovery project, there are many available options. Peptides, which have been around for at least 60 years, are one way in.  Other — and, in many cases, newer — available paths include recombinant proteins, engineered cells and DNA coding for the protein. 

As we’ve noted in some recent blog posts (here and here, for instance), our team at Antibody Solutions is joining the global scientific community in the collective fight against SARS-CoV-2 and its mutations. That includes both research conducted on behalf of our clients and our own discoveries. 

Examining mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 Spike (S) Protein Receptor Binding Domain (RBD) at the ACE2 receptor S protein interface

Conformational change of the spike protein furin cleavage domain may enhance virus infectivity

June 16, 2020 (Santa Clara, Calif.) — Research by two U.S.-based antibody discovery companies shows a rise and dominance of a mutant SARS-CoV-2 virus and identifies a new mechanism predicting a competitive advantage of the mutation. The mutation is predicted to induce a structural change in the spike protein of the virus that would enhance virus entry. The study, conducted by Antibody Solutions and Single Cell Technology (SCT), is available on Preprints.org (the study’s findings have not yet been peer-reviewed).

UPDATED 4/2/2020

On March 31, 2020, California Gov. Gavin Newsom extended the statewide shelter-in-place order through May 3, 2020. Additional restrictions designed to help protect citizens from the COVID-19 pandemic also were imposed.

Consistent with the March 19 order, this order considers life science companies such as Antibody Solutions to be “essential,” meaning we are exempt from many restrictions imposed on other businesses and can continue our operations. As specified in this order, we are preparing an updated document formalizing the social distancing protocol we had implemented in accordance with the first order.

UPDATED 3/20/2020

On March 19, 2020, California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced statewide requirements in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. These required actions in this order align with the Santa Clara County shelter-in-place orders released earlier this week and have not imposed any additional restrictions on Antibody Solutions operations. We will continue to monitor this situation and provide updates, as necessary.  

On March 16, 2020, the Public Health Department of Santa Clara County, California, along with five other San Francisco Bay Area counties, issued a shelter-in-place order for all county residents in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. That includes us here at Antibody Solutions.

Antibody Solutions’ Grand Opening Celebration | 01.30.20

From sparkling selfies and twirling mobiles of antibodies to insightful speeches, facility tours and tasty tacos, Antibody Solutions’ Grand Opening celebration last week had a little bit of everything. And we couldn’t be prouder!(*)

More than 125 treasured clients, partners and their families came together for what could be--and was—an evening of fun, festivity and friendship. We held the event to commemorate both our new 33,300-square-foot facility in Santa Clara, Calif., and the kickoff to our Silver Anniversary. The theme for our event was “25 Years of Revealing the Future,” and it was especially wonderful to welcome many guests who’ve been with us through the decades. 

Agreement Provides for Easy Access to the Transgenic H2L2 Harbour Mice™ Platform with Antibody Solutions’ Discovery and Development Services