Scientists are creating a new coronavirus jab that even works on viruses they have not yet discovered, in a bid to beat the next pandemic

Scientists have developed a jab to help protect against multiple coronaviruses, even ones we aren’t even aware of yet, according to its makers.

Set up by experts from the universities of Oxford, Cambridge and Caltech in California, the project aims to ‘proactively’ build a vaccine before the next potential pandemic-causing pathogen even becomes a threat.

The experimental shot, which has only been tested on mice so far, works by training the immune system to recognize parts of many different coronaviruses, a family of viruses that also includes Covid, SARS and MERS.

Current vaccines work by training the immune system to target one specific type of virus, such as the measles shot. But the new shot can target several people.

Such a shot could ensure that people are protected against multiple types of coronavirus in one dose, including, in theory, types currently unknown to science.

The jab works using a small ball of protein, called a ‘quartet nanocage’.

Scientists then used what they called a “protein superglue” to attach antigens. These are substances that cause an immune response in the body, allowing it to fight pathogens.

The resulting vaccine allows the immune system to recognize parts of eight coronaviruses.

This includes some that are currently only found in wild bats, but could theoretically infect humans in the future.

Using multiple antigens in this way allows the immune system to target parts of coronaviruses that are found in many individual viruses, including some that have not yet been found.

For example, tests showed that the shot helped mice fight SARS-Cov-1, the pathogen that caused the 2003 SARS outbreak.

This is despite the fact that the injection does not specifically include samples of this virus.

Rory Hills, a graduate researcher in pharmacology at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Pharmacology and the first author of the report, said: “Our focus is on creating a vaccine that will protect us against the next one coronavirus pandemic, and get it done before the pandemic even starts.”

He added: ‘We have created a vaccine that protects against a wide range of different coronaviruses – including ones we don’t even know about yet.’

Professor Mark Howarth, a senior author of the study, said the results could be a stepping stone to creating new vaccines that are even faster than those created during the darkest days of the Covid pandemic.

“Scientists did a great job of quickly producing a highly effective Covid vaccine during the last pandemic, but the world still faced a massive crisis with a large number of deaths,” he said.

“We need to figure out how to do better in the future, and a powerful part of that is starting to build the vaccines up front.”

Publishing their results Nature Nanotechnology the scientists hope to begin clinical trials of their new vaccine in early 2025.