MIMIC® Benefits

The MIMIC® System can capture human diversity. Each well in the MIMIC® System’s 96-well plastic microtiter plate represents a human immune system. MIMIC® highly sensitive functional assays simulate a clinical trial for a diverse population, without ever putting human subjects at risk.

Fully Human

MIMIC® technology is based on autologous primary human immune cells. One surrogate human provides all controls (no drug, drug, drug dosing, drug + pathogen) and can be repeated multiple times.

Diverse

The MIMIC® process can include a diverse donor pool comprising hundreds of individuals.

Comprehensive

The MIMIC® System models innate and/or adaptive and functional immune responses; analysis is available for cytokines, APCs, T cells, and B cells for a better selection of drug candidates for clinical evaluation.

Cost Effective

Because the MIMIC® System is predictive, it can lead to faster cycle times for discovery and reduce the time and costs to bring drugs to the market.

Modular

MIMIC® processing is high-throughput and automated with thousands of assays per month. Learn more about MIMIC® System modules.

Sensitive and Accurate

MIMIC® technology is more sensitive than standard PBMC assays. See our case studies, Peripheral Tissue Equivalent Module Compared to PBMC Assay and Lymphoid Tissue Equivalent Module Versus PBMC Assay, for more details.

 
Research Pre-Clinical Development Clinical Development Production

Vaccines that are effective for more people against more pathogen strains

  • Human responses to antigens and adjuvants rather than animal responses
  • MIMIC® System captures human diversity including prior pathogen exposure, age, gender, and HLA haplotypes
  • Assess cross-reactivity and predict cross-protection and effects of antigenic shift and drift in pathogens

Evaluate vaccine candidates for safety and effectiveness in humans before clinical development begins to stop failures early

  • MIMIC® System predicts the effectiveness of a vaccine candidate in the human population
  • Clinical Trial in a Test Tube™ couples the in vitro immune system with an in vitro functional assay/disease model
  • Simulates the effectiveness of the immune response generated by a vaccine on the disease
  • Monitors for undesirable immune responses such as auto-antibodies

Compare safety and potency of vaccines made with different processes and identify and characterize unexpected results during a clinical trial

  • MIMIC® System can characterize vaccines made with different processes to determine equivalence
  • Results from preclinical studies can guide clinical trials
  • MIMIC® technology can monitor responses in trial subjects and rapidly identify and characterize any unexpected vaccine effects

MIMIC® technology offers a robust potency assay for release of vaccine

  • MIMIC® technology can provide a potency assay for batch release of vaccine lots
  • Eliminate variability of animal tests and complexity of other methods (for example, antibody-based characterization)
  • Potential to identify safety issues before vaccine is released
  • More accurate than other in vitro assays and animal models
  • Find potential immunotoxicity problems earlier in the research and development process
  • Enables mechanism of action studies to understand adverse immune responses and find solutions

Standard immunotoxicity tests use in vitro PBMC assays and animal models (usually rodents) to determine whether a drug, vaccine, or other product induces a potentially adverse immune response. Unfortunately, these tests can sometimes produce misleading results. VaxDesign has shown that the MIMIC® System is more sensitive and accurate than standard PBMC assays.

We have also shown that the MIMIC® System reproduces human responses to immunosuppressants and immunopotentiators, in some cases where rodent and non-human primate studies did not.

Discovery and Early Development Process Development Manufacture
  • Detect potential immunogenicity issues early and de-prioritize immunogenic molecules
  • Find and understand molecular changes that increase or decrease immunogenicity
  • Compare immunogenicity with research product
  • Measure relative immunogenicity of molecules produced with different processes
  • Determine whether full scale manufacture affects immunogenicity
  • Monitor batches for changes in immunogenicity, especially after any process changes