Find out how to preserve vaccines without refrigeration for months

Vaccines are not good if damaged by heat during storage when moving. Therefore, how to keep the quality of the vaccine always makes scientists have to calculate.

In particular, when vaccines need to be taken to remote areas of the world, the preservation problem is extremely important. Even to transport vaccines, camels must be used to carry mini solar refrigerators on their backs.

Picture 1 of Find out how to preserve vaccines without refrigeration for months
Scientists have found a way to help preserve vaccines without refrigeration.

In fact, vaccines need to be cooled, uninterrupted called "cold chain" and in most cases require consistent storage.

To solve this problem, scientists have recently found a potential solution that allows vaccines to remain unchanged for weeks in hot and remote areas.

While other methods focus on vaccine reconstruction or modification, this new method is based on simple sugar additions .

Viruses are mixed and then dried into sugars, made up of a combination of two FDA-approved food preservatives, called pullulan and trehalose .

In this solution, vaccines can be transported without continuous cooling. Local doctors only need to add water before using it for patients.

"A possible explanation between these two compounds may be that trehalose provides protection during dehumidification while pullulan provides long-term stability by causing virus immobilization in the glass matrix" , the the author explained.

However, before this new solution can be put to the final test, researchers need to consider whether these results are safe for humans and whether the method works on any Any other vaccine.

If feasible, relatively cheap processes will eliminate almost all of the costs of delivering vaccines, which can often account for up to 80% of the entire vaccination process.

The authors are particularly excited with the prospect of distributing Ebola vaccines and many other vaccines.