A unique collaboration of representatives from academia, biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and the nonprofit sector is pioneering a bold approach to make safe, effective antimalarial medicines accessible to people in poor countries.

The partnership is applying a combination of synthetic biology, industrial fermentation, chemical synthesis, and drug development expertise to a very specific need of the developing world. In doing so, the partnership sets an example of how groups with critical knowledge and skills can pool talents to address a major global health problem. A key element of this project is the application of basic research principles to a real-world issue.

Armed with a $42.6 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Institute for OneWorld Health formed a funded research and development collaboration, known as the Artemisinin Project, with Prof. Jay Keasling at the University of California, Berkeley and Amyris to develop semisynthetic artemisinin. In 2008, sanofi-aventis joined the collaborative effort to apply their expertise in process development and manufacturing scale-up.

Malaria has become increasingly resistant to front-line medications, but combination drugs containing artemisinin derivatives show nearly 100 percent effectiveness after a brief, three-day regimen. Yet, even at a price of approximately $2.20 per adult course for artemisinin combination therapies (ACTs) approved by the World Health Organization 1, these drugs are still beyond the reach of millions of the world's poorest people.

Over the course of the grant, the project aims to create, optimize, scale-up, and industrialize microbial production systems to make bulk artemisinin available for incorporation into ACTs, at a low price with consistent high quality. A second source of artemisinin, in addition to plant-derived material, is needed to ensure global supply needs can be fulfilled due to current market volatility. If technical benchmarks are achieved, the project would progress to the commercial manufacturing phase with the goal to facilitate integration of semisynthetic artemisinin into the supply chain and ACTs.