$2 Million Award to Develop mRNA-Based Broad Protecting Influenza Vaccine Without Needles

Today, Micron Biomedical announced that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) awarded the company $2 million to continue its work on broadly protecting avian and seasonal flu vaccines.

The company won the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) Patch Forward competition. The $2 million award will advance Micron’s work to co-develop needle-free versions of broadly protecting influenza vaccines with Zipcode Bio, a biotechnology company focusing on next-generation RNA medicines.

“Making all vaccines, including influenza vaccines, more broadly protecting and more accessible has the potential to save lives globally, and we are thrilled to be recognized by the HHS, BARDA, as one of the most important vaccine innovations rethinking how vaccines will be administered,” said Steven Damon, CEO of Micron Biomedical, in a press release on January 14, 2025.

“We are thrilled to continue our collaboration with Zipcode Bio and accelerate efforts to make the dream of needle-free, broadly protecting influenza vaccines a reality.”

Micron’s technology uses a dissolvable microarray “button” applied to the skin. The button painlessly delivers a vaccine or therapeutic directly into the uppermost dermal layers when pushed. The button can be self-administered or administered by a caregiver or parent. 

Micron previously announced that it had received a $7.5 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, for a total of $43 million in support from the organization.

Over the past decade, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the National Academy of Sciences have written, A future influenza pandemic is inevitable.... are we ready?

From January 2003 to November 2023, the WHO reported 246 cases of human infection with the avian influenza A(H5N1) virus from four WHO Western Pacific Region countries. Of these, 138 were fatal, resulting in a case fatality rate (CFR) of 56%.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Agriculture, mammalian infections with the highly pathogenic avian influenza virus will be a global concern in 2025.

As of early 2025, the U.S. government has invested in developing avian influenza vaccine candidates.