www.checkbiotech.org ; www.raupp.info ; www.czu.cz

Dow AgroSciences has won the first federal approval of a plant-made vaccine,
the product of a laboratory process that avoids the controversial use of
pharmaceutical field crops, February 2006 by Philip Brasher.

The chicken vaccine will not be commercialized, but officials with Dow
AgroSciences said Tuesday that winning approval from the U.S. Agriculture
Depart- ment's Center for Veterinary Biologics in Ames, Ia., showed the
promise for making pharmaceuticals from plant cells, rather than animal
products or whole plants.

"We felt it was extremely important to understand whether or not this
technology platform could meet" the USDA's regulatory requirements, said
Butch Mercer, the company's global business leader for animal health.

Dow's advance comes amid lingering concerns about using genetically
engineered field crops, such as corn, to produce pharmaceuticals.

Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack has been pushing the pharmaceutical corn production,
but research in that area has slowed because of strong opposition from the
food industry and a series of highly publicized mistakes by biotech
companies. Food companies fear that pharmaceutical crops could contaminate
ingredient supplies.

Dow AgroSciences, an Indianapolis-based unit of Dow Chemical Co., developed
its vaccine by fermenting bioengineered tobacco cells in steel tanks.

The plant cells produce the antigens used to make the vaccine against
Newcastle disease, a contagious and fatal viral disease affecting all
species of birds.

Vaccines are typically made from chicken eggs or in mammalian cells, which
can carry diseases. The Dow process also uses fragments of the virus, rather
than the entire pathogen, in making the vaccine.

"It's inherently safer because you're not treating an animal with a virus,"
said John Cuffe, the company's research and development leader for animal
health.

The plant-made vaccine also does not need cold storage.

Dow has several commercial products in development, all intended for
animals. The first product is not expected to reach the market before 2009
or 2010. There are already several Newcastle vaccines on the market.

"Clearly, the advantage of all this is that it gets around the containment
issue" involved in growing pharmaceutical plants outdoors, said Stephen
Howell, director of Iowa State University's Plant Sciences Institute.

The laboratory process would be useful for making products that aren't
needed in large quantities, Howell said.

Making a vaccine from the fermented tobacco cells requires only a fraction
of the material needed for some drugs, such as digestive aids that would be
made from corn.

Stephanie Childs, a spokeswoman for the Grocery Manufacturers of America,
said the food industry welcomed finding methods of drug manufacturing that
"maintain the purity of the food supply."

[desmoinesregister.com]

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