Microneedle Patches for COVID-19 vaccination

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A researcher from Carnegie Mellon University creates microneedle drug patches which can support COVID-19 Vaccination.

As none of countries is safe from the pandemic of COVID-19 virus, many professionals, especially in the medical field, have to take part in this battle. While health professionals are fighting against the virus, engineers are working to support them by inventing advanced technology to enhance medication. Now, Burak Ozdoganlar from Carnegie Mellon University is developing microneedle patches that support researchers who are working on potential vaccines.

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These microneedle patches are similar to previous ones co-developed by Carnegie Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh which are used with the PittCoVacc vaccine.
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Ozdoganlar, a professor of mechanical engineering at Carnegie Mellon said, “I’m seeking researchers who are working on a vaccine against, or treatment for, SARS-CoV-2 to collaborate with me. My lab can fabricate hundreds of microneedle arrays with your viable vaccine or antiviral drug very quickly for testing in your vaccine and drug development, and we can ramp up to thousands if needed.”

“Furthermore, once a viable vaccine is identified, we can provide the necessary expertise, experience, and connections to scale-up the manufacturing of the vaccine patches using Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) guidelines to the levels that will effectively address the COVID-19 vaccination needs. We are here to do our part in providing support throughout this epidemic.”

What is the function of microneedle patches?

Firstly, a microneedle patch, which is about the size of a contact lens, contains hundreds of tiny needles. Secondly, the materials used to make these tiny needles are biodissolvable sugar-like natural materials. Thus, when the researcher fabricates the microneedles, the researcher mixes the drug or vaccine with this water-soluble material. Once this microneedle patch is applied to the patient’s skin, the microneedles rapidly dissolve and deliver the medication to the patient’s body. Also, patients do not have to worry about pain or bleeding because of the tiny size of the needles.  

While traditional syringe vaccines which have to be injected directly into muscle tissue require large dose of vaccine, the microneedles need smaller dose to build up immunity. 
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Retrieved from: https://engineering.cmu.edu/news-events/news/2020/04/07-microneedle-array.html