Personalised cancer vaccines at commodity cost through fully automated manufacturing

Individualised neoantigen mRNA vaccines have shown reduced recurrence in melanoma with pembrolizumab (phase 2b, with phase 3 ongoing) and immune responses in pancreatic cancer, but require bespoke sequencing, epitope selection and GMP manufacture per patient at very high cost. The proposal is an engineering programme for end-to-end automation: standardised sample-to-sequence pipelines, validated epitope prediction, continuous-flow mRNA synthesis and formulation in closed robotic units sited regionally, and regulatory acceptance of platform-based release testing, targeting a manufactured cost under a few thousand dollars and turnaround under three weeks.