The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) has awarded a contract to nonprofit organization Southern Research to develop novel animal models for testing the effectiveness of medical countermeasures against biological threat agents.
BARDA is a division of the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response within the US Departmentof Health and Human Services (HHS).
The contract guarantees a minimum of $50,000 and a maximum of $100 million.
“This work will play a key role in protecting against potential public health issues,” said Zara Llewellyn, Ph.D., Project Manager at Southern Research and Principal Investigator, in a news release. “Our research will help to successfully develop vaccines and therapeutics that will be used to protect people against exposure to biological threat agents. This work is important, especially since drug and vaccine effectiveness against many of these diseases could never be verified in clinical studies.”