Bioengineered Proteins for Chemical/Biological Defense, Protection, and Decontamination

The objective is completion of the project, initiated in Phase I, to generate transgenic chickens capable of expressing and secreting specified proteins into the whites of eggs, allowing economical large scale production. In the Phase I effort, seventeenbirds were shown to have generated transgenic sperm as demanded by the criteria for success specified in the research protocols. This satisfies our Phase I objective. It is intended that the Phase I results will be extended in Phase II to generate avianscapable of producing large quantities of pharmaceutical proteins (vaccines, antibodies, antidotes, etc.) in their eggs to allow efficient and economical production for commercial purposes as well as Public Health and Defense Department needs. The Companyhas already received contacts from industrial concerns interested in utilizing this technology for gaining access to otherwise unobtainable markets. In one instance the first year market for their first product would approximate $160M. Avian transgenictechnology has the potential to provide vast quantities of protein products used in vaccines, biocides, antidotes and many as yet undiscovered applications owing to its enhanced and accessible scale of protein production coupled to its vastly lower costfor production. The modular character of the transgenic vector allows alternative protein expression systems to be introduced within the vector's genetic framework, to provide a versatile technique for altering production objectives to accommodatechanging customer requirements. People are increasingly concerned about the current world which witnesses rapid dissemination of new diseases by commercial transportation and the potential of bioterroism by sophisticated international criminals. Somemechanisms are required to provide large amounts of effective counteracting drugs. One immediate need for such agents is their use by our armed forces which must travel to remote regions of the world where exotic diseases flourish. Not only are largenumbers of troops in need of such protection, it is also in our country's interest to prevent rapidly spreading plagues from dispersing throughout the world. We believe that not only does transgenic poultry technology provide this production potential, italso has the ability to adapt rapidly to changing production requirements.