Comments on: Silk cages preserve vaccines and antibiotics for months without refrigeration

By: Jim

Jim — Sat, 14 Jul 2012 02:52:50 +0000

We need a place to gather these ideas together. Here’s another at http://bit.ly/NKZbVx that uses cell phone tower power sources in developing countries to keep vaccine refrigerators running.

By: Ed Yong

Ed Yong — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 19:55:24 +0000

@Ian – Ha! I was just talking about this with an engineer I was interviewing this afternoon. He said: “We spent about four months fabricating…” and my eyebrows shot up

By: Erin

Erin — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 12:18:37 +0000

This is amazing!

But one question: If the molecules are wrapped in silk–which, as you say, may extend their life by protecting their surface proteins from destructive enzymes–wouldn’t this also prevent them from functioning as desired? (That is, interacting once in vivo?) The silk may be *safe* to “inject into babies,” but don’t the same properties of the silk packaging that protect the drugs from degradation also prevent them from their desired interactions? Did Zhang unpack them somehow before testing potency?

By: IW

IW — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 11:23:48 +0000

How do we know these data about silk are not…fabricated? Huh? Huh? Huh?!

By: Alexander

Alexander — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 10:28:27 +0000

Sounds very promising. A lot of praise for silk so far this month: http://bit.ly/RTjdOW. The caterpillars will have to work overtime.

By: mfumbesi

mfumbesi — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 05:33:25 +0000

Who would dare go off wrapped up in silk. I tell you these vaccines are living a life of luxury….Sorry it to be done.

By: Ed Yong

Ed Yong — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 02:08:38 +0000

@Oscar and D – The silk wraps around the actual molecules, not the bottles. Think of individual silk molecules assembling into something a bit like a sheet of bubblewrap – tightly packed areas with looser “pockets”. That’s what the vaccine virus particles sit in. Sorry that wasn’t clear. And it’s biodegradable. Silk has been used for similar purposes in other medical applications and it lasts long enough to deliver the payload before later disintegrating.

@Peter – Good call. I killed the “virtually”.

By: D

Tue, 10 Jul 2012 22:43:08 +0000

Could you describe the silk cages a bit more? Are we talking silk molecules wrapped around the virus particles? Or is the MMR unreconstituted powder kept in a silk pouch? Sorry for such basic questions, but I can’t visualize this at all.

By: Peter Beattie

Peter Beattie — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 22:10:16 +0000

Just a small niggly point of writing technique: “a month at 60 is virtually unheard of” – do you mean it’s never actually been done? That you have no idea whether it has? The adjective seems to add a qualification that only obscures what the actual statement is.

By: Oscar Lopez

Oscar Lopez — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 21:02:15 +0000

Very interesting. But I have a point of confusion: Do you mean that the silk is wrapped around the molecules of the vaccine or antibiotic (the silk is part of the vaccine) or around the bottles/syringes/etc. containing the vaccine? If the former, is it easy to disengage the silk again once the vaccine/antibiotic must be administered?