Jake is part of a research team at the Institute for Protein Design (IPD) in Seattle that is currently developing a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine with their virus-like particle vaccine platform (see picture at bottom). This work is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and is in collaboration with groups at the Vaccine Research Center at the NIH. Needless to say, it has been exciting and humbling to be a part of a group developing a vaccine that the world badly needs and is demanding in the midst of this unprecedented pandemic.
A few weeks ago, it was surprising when images came out in the media with Trump and Anthony Fauci (head of NIH’s NIAID) alongside a model of the IPD’s influenza vaccine particles. The NYTimes columnist Michelle Goldberg wrote a column on Trump’s calamitous response to the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak that contained the 1st image below. The picture caption originally stated that Trump was being shown a model of a coronavirus, but it’s not a model of a coronavirus — it’s the IPD’s protein nanoparticle with influenza hemagglutinin proteins attached around the particle’s surface. We wrote an email to the NYTimes about this error and they promptly corrected the photo caption! We thank everyone at the NYTimes who make it one of the premier news organizations in the world and operate with the highest levels of integrity and principles.
Photo in NYTimes column that Jake corrected its caption.
The correction posted by the NYTimes.
Another photo that circulated in the media.
A model generated by the CDC of SARS-CoV-2.
An electron micrograph from the CDC of coronavirus particles captured by Dr. Fred Murphy. Each particle is about 100 nm in diameter.
A schematic of the IPD’s protein nanoparticle vaccine platform from Marcandalli et al. 2019.