Oragenics Extends Collaboration with NRC Canada For Omicron-Specific Vaccine

Oragenics Inc OGEN has extended a licensing and collaboration agreement with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) to enable Oragenics to pursue an intranasal vaccine designed against omicron variant. 

• The NRC cell expression technologies provide Oragenics with a platform to generate cell lines for high-yield production of spike protein antigens for existing and emerging variants of concern. 
• This platform should allow the production of cell lines within six to eight weeks of spike gene sequence availability, compared with six to nine months for traditional production of such cell lines. 
• Related: Oragenics COVID-19 Vaccine Candidate Shows Encouraging Preclinical Action.
• The NRC technologies will expedite the evaluation of an omicron-specific Terra-CoV-2 candidate in preclinical and clinical studies.
• Oragenics recently demonstrated the protection of hamsters against SARS-CoV-2 with the intranasal Terra-CoV-2 candidate, supporting the further development into an IND-enabling GLP toxicology study and Phase 1 clinical study.
• Price Action: OGEN shares are up 17.5% at $0.56 during the market session on the last check Monday.