. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2023 Sep 6.

Published in final edited form as: ACS Nano. 2021 Apr 1;15(4):5793–5818. doi: 10.1021/acsnano.1c01845

Table 2:

Leading mRNA Vaccine Nanoparticles

Developer	Vaccine name	Nanoparticle formulation	Antigen/adjuvancy	Clinical advancement
Moderna^38-44	mRNA-1273 (100 μg/dose)	Lipid nanoparticle, 80–100 nm, composed of the ionizable cationic lipid (designated “H”), PC, cholesterol and PEG (molar ratio 50:10:38.5:1.5)	Nonreplicating RNA, encoding full length S protein in its pre-fusion formation (2P mutation plus intact S1/S2 cleavage site). Uridine-modified RNA provides adjuvancy.	Phases 1–3 completed FDA–EUA
Pfizer/BioNtech^42-48	BNT162b2 (plus other experimental variations) (30 μg/dose)	Lipid nanoparticle, 80 nm, composed of ionizable cationic lipid, ALC-0315 (Acuitas), PC, cholesterol and PEG	Self-replicating RNA coding for full length S protein in its pre-fusion formation (additional variants with non-replicating RNA, expressing RBD that contains a T4 fibritin-derived trimerization domain were also developed and tested). Uridine-modified RNA provides adjuvancy.	Phases 1–3 completed FDA–EUA
Imperial College London²⁴	LNP-nCoV-saRNA (1 μg/dose)	Lipid nanoparticle (LPNP100), composed of ionizable cationic Acuitas lipid (designated A9), PC, cholesterol and a PEG-lipid	Self-replicating RNA, encoding for full length S protein in its prefusion formation. The plasmid vector for synthesizing the self-amplifying replicon was derived from the Trinidad donkey Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus strain (VEEV) alphavirus	Phase 1/2
Arcturus (Duke/NUS)¹¹⁸	ARCT-021 (1-10 μg/dose)	Lipid nanoparticle LUNAR^®, composed of 50% ionizable amino lipids (Lipid2.2), 7% PC, 40% cholesterol, 3% dimyristoyl-sn-glycerol and methoxy-polyethylene glycol	STARR^™ self-replicating mRNA technology, full length spike protein	Phase 1/2

Abbreviations: PC, phosphatidylcholine; PEG, polyethylene glycol; RBD, receptor-binding domain.