Merck enlists 4D Pharma's microbiome platform in a bid to build a new class of vaccines
Merck has signed a research deal with 4D Pharma to use its MicroRX platform to turn living bacteria into vaccines.
The collaboration comes in the nascent field of “live biotherapeutics” – a term the FDA uses to describe living organisms, generally bacteria, used as medicine. 4D Pharma, a small biotech based in Leeds, UK, builds its LBP by extracting bacteria from a healthy donor and putting it in a capsule patients swallow.
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