Say Goodbye To Needles: Blast Away Disease with a Puff of Air – A Painless, Precise Vaccine Delivery System

Scientists have announced a groundbreaking new method for delivering vaccines that could make needles a thing of the past. Utilizing compressed gas and powdered vaccines that don’t require refrigeration, the “MOF-Jet” could provide an easy and painless way to administer vaccines and therapeutic treatments for a range of diseases, including cancer.

During the pandemic lockdown, boredom led to a groundbreaking new research project. Dr. Jeremiah Gassensmith, the principal investigator, purchased affordable components of a compressed gas-powered jet injection system to tinker with at home. When the team returned to campus, he handed the components over to Yalini Wijesundara, a graduate student, and challenged her to see what she could create with them.

Undeterred, Wijesundara drew on her previous research into jet injectors dating back to the 1960s and modified the system to fire solids, realizing that they could be used to deliver cargo enclosed in metal-organic frameworks (MOFs).

These structures, which can act as “molecular cages” for a variety of materials, including proteins and nucleic acids, had already been studied by the lab. Combining the MOFs with the modified jet injector, Wijesundara created the “MOF-Jet,” which can deliver powders to cells using bursts of air. Both Gassensmith and Wijesundara are from The University of Texas at Dallas.

While jet injectors have been widely used in the military, they have drawbacks such as being painful and potentially spreading diseases like Hepatitis B due to fluid splashing back. The “gene gun,” a more modern version of the injector, is used in veterinary medicine and is considerably more expensive.

It shoots biological cargo into cells, with the cargo typically attached to metal microparticles made of gold or tungsten. Unfortunately, once these particles penetrate the skin, they remain there and can accelerate the breakdown of biological material.

An alternative approach is to use MOFs to enclose the cargo. Gassensmith’s team has previously worked with a specific MOF, zeolitic-imidazolate framework eight (ZIF-8).

“Compared to gold, it’s cheap and protects biological materials, such as nucleic acids,” points out Wijesundara. “We can also store vaccine formulations within it as powders at room temperature, which eliminates the need for the extremely cold temperatures many liquid vaccines require.”

To protect biological materials from breaking down too quickly, the team has utilized ZIF-8 to encase a variety of biological materials. They delivered these materials into cells using their gene gun-inspired “MOF-Jet,” which they had modified. Wijesundara designed “bullets” for the device, with each bullet containing a dose of functionalized ZIF-8.

A puff of gas then propelled the powdered formulation into cells, which was as simple as “pointing and shooting.” Testing the system, they found that the MOF-Jet effectively delivered a ZIF-8-encased gene to onion cells and a ZIF-8-encased protein to mice. Gassensmith notes that the injector’s blast feels no more painful than being hit with a Nerf bullet, making it a less painful alternative to needle-based injections.

After experimenting with the MOF-Jet, Wijesundara discovered that cargo release could be adjusted by changing the injector’s carrier gas. Since ZIF-8 is sensitive to acidic environments, carbon dioxide’s reaction with water in cells creates carbonic acid, which aids in the breakdown of MOF.

“If you shoot it with carbon dioxide, it will release its cargo faster within cells; if you use regular air, it will take four or five days,” she adds.

As a result, the same medication could be released over varying durations without altering its composition.

“Once we realized that, it opened up a lot of possibilities,” adds Gassensmith.

The team is presently utilizing this technology to administer chemotherapeutic drugs and adjuvants for the treatment of melanoma, the most severe type of skin cancer. The MOF-Jet’s capability to disperse substances over a large area makes it a more efficient method of distributing cancer treatments into melanomas than needles, which are currently used.

Additionally, by adjusting the carrier gas, the team can provide chemotherapeutic treatments with quick or gradual release times based on a patient’s requirements. While the research is still in progress, early tests are producing promising outcomes.

According to Wijesundara and Gassensmith, the flexibility of the MOF-Jet technology opens the door to a wide range of applications, including veterinary medicine, agriculture, and perhaps even human vaccination or treatment.

The team’s research will be presented at the upcoming American Chemical Society (ACS) Spring 2023 meeting being held from March 26-30.

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