Table 1.
Publications in PubMed (PMID) and NIH funding associated with research on technologies used in candidate COVID-19 vaccines as well as vaccine development for selected epidemic threats.
| PMID (1960–2019) | NIH-funded PMID (1980–2019)1 | Project Years (1980–2019) | Project Costs (2000–2019)2 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Selected vaccine technologies (unique)3 | 51530 | 8420 (16%) | 16358 | $17,171 |
| Synthetic Vaccines4 | 21742 | 3935 (18%) | 9755 | $9653 |
| Adjuvants, general | 14347 | 2132 (15%) | 5369 | $5642 |
| DNA (nucleic acid) vaccines5 | 7621 | 1464 (19%) | 3742 | $4585 |
| Live, Attenuated Virus | 8147 | 1399 (17%) | 3382 | $4053 |
| Viral vector-based | 1191 | 379 (32%) | 1010 | $1651 |
| Inactivated virus | 5929 | 515 (8.7%) | 1199 | $1469 |
| TLR9 agonists (adjuvant) | 1227 | 353 (29%) | 1082 | $1096 |
| mRNA vaccines | 767 | 174 (23%) | 534 | $943 |
| Virus-like particles | 801 | 161 (20%) | 418 | $583 |
| Nanoparticle-based | 761 | 121 (16%) | 334 | $519 |
| Vaccines against selected epidemic threats | ||||
| HIV | 5806 | 2024 (35%) | 6684 | $9184 |
| Coronavirus | 2435 | 388 (16%) | 625 | $767 |
| Ebola | 450 | 115 (26%) | 294 | $639 |
| Zika | 375 | 135 (36%) | 390 | $555 |
| Dengue | 725 | 110 (15%) | 231 | $331 |
Number of NIH-funded PMID and % of all PMID.
Costs given in millions of dollars inflation adjusted to 2018.
The “unique” number of PMID, NIH-funded PMID, Project Years, and Project Costs is greater than the sum of values for the individual technologies examined due to PMID addressing multiple technologies, being identified in multiple searches or having multiple sources of funding as well as Projects that produce multiple PMID. Duplication between technologies is eliminated in calculating “unique” values.
“Synthetic vaccines” is a MeSH term describing vaccines incorporating recombinant protein antigens.
Search performed for DNA vaccines included many reports describing mRNA technologies.