Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator • Hacker News Board

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#91

Post by icinnamon » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 7:22 PM UTC

opendomain wrote: post #40

icinnamon wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm Ian Cinnamon, one of the members of the Immunity Project YC team. We have in fact developed the vaccine. We've completed 2 years of animal testing, and we have one final experiment to run before we start our Phase I Clinical Trials in humans. In order to test the efficacy of the vaccine in human trials, we go to Durban, South Africa, where HIV has a prevalence rate of ~15%. We dose a wide range of healthy volunte…

Ian- YOU developed the vaccine for HIV? Were you part of some team from a university? Or did some other company develop the real science and you are partnering with them? How can you offer everyone in the world a free vaccine for your crowdfunding target of only $500K? where does the money you raise go?

Our Immunity Project Science team, led by Dr. Reid Rubsamen, developed the vaccine. The $500K pays for our final experiment before we begin our Phase I Clinical Trials. We've already conducted over a decade of research and two years of pre-clinical trials with overwhelming success.

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#92

Post by naveenspark » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 7:35 PM UTC

opendomain wrote: post #75

simonk wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you look at the fundraising page they have a budget but it looks like the $500k just pays for the next experiment it wont even get them to Phase 1. Microsoft Research gave them $1M to get this far.

I did some more research and would really like a clarifcation of this project. First of all - Flow Pharma is the inventor of the vsaccine - they are a FOR PROFIT angel backed company. Why do they need crowdfunding? Second - How does Immunity project work? It seems that the real non-profit is "Until there is a cure". So you are donating money to them, which then give the money to the immunity project which pays for a…

More then happy to give you the full details on how we've set this up: the vaccine is being developed by Flow Pharma Inc. Instead of setting up our own 501(c)3, we setup a fiscal sponsorship agreement with Until There's A Cure, a leading HIV/AIDS focused 501(c)3. We are operating the project as a non profit even though our entity type is technically a corp. In other words we are obligated to follow 501(c)3 rules and regulations, and we are obligated to give our vaccine away for free regardless of our entity type. The primary reason we did this is because its much better to work with a well established 501(c)3 that has team members who can help provide validation and support then to start from scratch on your own. It is also much faster to do this then setup your own 501(c)3.

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#93

Post by napoleoncomplex » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 7:37 PM UTC

pg wrote: post #2

Lest anyone be confused by that headline, there are 6 other nonprofits in the current batch. So there is a 7-way tie for 2nd nonprofit.

I have been at times vocal in opposition to the type of companies that YC has funded in the past few batches, as the possibility of them improving life quality for people that actually need the improvement seemed quite small, largely based on a prospect of trickle down technology, which turns out to be as likely as trickle down economics, in that it rarely trickles out of San Francisco. Not saying those start-ups were easy, or not worth doing, as doing any start-up is by nature incredibly hard, and following your passion is always worth doing. But, YC's prominent role seemed ideal for doing something more, and it just didn't come.

I'll be equally vocal in support now. Watsi was the first sign of light, Immunity Project the second. This is what needs support, what needs money and hype. Realistically it won't get as much money as it needs, but with someone like YC pushing nonprofits like this, it's a huge step in the right direction. I can't wait to see the other nonprofits.

I know I sound like a bitter communist (is there any other kind?), but this really feels like an island of reason in the bubbly ocean of SF. Good luck to this batch.

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#94

Post by BlackDeath3 » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 7:42 PM UTC

naveenspark wrote: post #65

sgift wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there some special "trick" that makes your team/approach so efficient or (just) the usual ones, e.g. less overhead due to small size, less bureaucracy than big pharma and so on?

Yes our overhead is far lower. Our other "trick" is that several members of our team are multi-talented. For example Dr. Herst can do tissue culture work, formulation development, analytical chemistry, and immunochemistry.

That said, what's your bus factor like?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_factor

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#95

Post by TeMPOraL » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 7:59 PM UTC

rdl wrote: post #63

This is going to be really inconvenient for all the people who say "sure, you are good at making photo sharing apps and dating sites, but you don't cure cancer or anything."

Yeah, lets wait and see how fast they get their $25M. Giiven that photo sharing apps can get billions of dollars just like that, if the Immunity Project will have to struggle for their $25M, I'm giving up on SV altogether.

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#96

Post by rgejman » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 8:04 PM UTC

naveenspark wrote: post #34

anu_gupta wrote: post #26

I'd like to understand why organisations like the Gates Foundation / NIH aren't excited by this approach? I'm assuming they've rejected this, which would explain the need to crowdfinance the next part. If they haven't rejected it, why aren't they being approached for grants? Also, where's the science? Having something in the FAQ that states "We're awaiting publication in a peer-reviewed journal" is, to be blunt, pret…

We are pursuing all major funders we know of for funding for our work (including Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation etc.). The challenge is that it takes significant time to prepare grants apps, and go through the process. Some large funders such as EJAF only accept grant applications once a year. HIV/AIDS is an urgent challenge. Therefore we are crowd funding these dollars now to move our project forward immediately.…

I'm confused as to why you would encourage anyone to donate money to your organization without providing any data. I'm also confused about why you care about publication in traditional scientific mediums. You are starting a company and it would be in your interest to release as much data as possible about your successes in an attempt to raise money.

Not to mention, there are some journals that will publish pre-printed data. Here's a partial list (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_academic_journals_by_pr...) although take that list with a grain of salt because the pre-print policies may only really apply to math/physics publications.

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#97

Post by TeMPOraL » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 8:04 PM UTC

unclebucknasty wrote: post #86

On one hand, it's clearly great news that this work is being funded. But, maybe I'm the odd guy, here. At a higher level, does it bother anyone else even slightly that more and more of the world's priorities are being set by fewer and fewer people? This is how it's been to some extent for millennia. But, with increasing income/wealth disparity in the world, its effect is amplified. This, of course, is a terrible exam…

I get what you're talking about, but right now I personally feel happy that this effect is increasing, and I hope to be the part of this small group at some point.

It's because, to be honest, majority of humans just doesn't give a crap about anything that's further than 10cm from the end of their noses. The opposite of world priorities being set by fewer and fewer people is not lots of good things happening, it's nothing of importance ever happening. Want a proof? Just look at internal politics of every democratic state. Tons of resources get wasted, and nothing ever gets done, because people just can't agree on anything.

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#98

Post by judah » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 8:16 PM UTC

humannature wrote: post #85

judah wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bill Gates just addressed this [1], showing the faulty thinking behind this idea that saving lives is ultimately bad for the earth. "It may be counterintuitive, but the countries with the most deaths have among the fastest-growing populations in the world. This is because the women in these countries tend to have the most births, too. This pattern of falling death rates followed by falling birth rates applies for the…

highest population today.. yes but what about pollution levels? highest ever too? natural resources also more depleted than ever? your post doesn't address the issue of overpopulation...

Pollution levels are not at their highest [1]. And even if they were, it would not mean we should stop saving lives.

Gates' post shows that saving lives actually helps overpopulation, historically. And through technological advances, we are more resource rich than we ever have been. That you're sitting there in a comfy, heated office with all the food, money, and resources you ever will need is evidence of this. Better yet, the same resource richness you now enjoy is spreading around the world [1].

Natural resources: if you mean things like oil, well, that is a resource only humans need to use; our using that resource isn't a bad thing in itself. Yes, it has some negative side effects, and yes, it will eventually run out. But when it does, we'll move on through more technology.

The "world is doomed because of too many humans" thinking is terribly shortsighted because it assumes humans will never increase resources, solve diseases, and never populate other planets. Those assumptions are increasingly shown to unlikely, if not foolish.

[1]: http://annualletter.gatesfoundation.org/#section=myth-one

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#99

Post by RoboTeddy » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 8:22 PM UTC

naveenspark wrote: post #84

RoboTeddy wrote: post #78

How heavily does the project depend on obtaining correct target epitopes from Heckerman's protein Gibbs free energy simulation? Is there a chance that HIV won't be controlled even if we can induce the immune system to be capable of targeting some of the peptide sequences that controllers often target? (i.e., might there be something else at work in controllers?) Thanks for working on an important project!

Right now the project is only relying epitopes derived from actual controller targets. Our hypothesis is that if we go after the epitopes that HIV controllers preferentially target that we will get an immune response with memory in humans just as we have so far in our animal studies. The only way to test this is to execute on our clinical trial in humans. The current experiment we are aiming to perform is a good midd…

The experiment in blood sounds interesting, I hope it works!

It looks like there might be differences between controller immune systems and regular ones that don't have to do with choice of epitope:

http://jid.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2013/12/19/infdi...

Does this make it less likely that targeting specific epitopes is all there is to the picture? (I'm happy to assume that we'll get an immune response with memory in humans -- the question is, how confident should we be that that response will control HIV?)

Re: Startup developing HIV/AIDS vaccine is 2nd nonprofit accepted into Y Combinator

#100

Post by unclebucknasty » Thu, Jan 23, 2014, 8:29 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #97

unclebucknasty wrote: post #86

On one hand, it's clearly great news that this work is being funded. But, maybe I'm the odd guy, here. At a higher level, does it bother anyone else even slightly that more and more of the world's priorities are being set by fewer and fewer people? This is how it's been to some extent for millennia. But, with increasing income/wealth disparity in the world, its effect is amplified. This, of course, is a terrible exam…

I get what you're talking about, but right now I personally feel happy that this effect is increasing, and I hope to be the part of this small group at some point. It's because, to be honest, majority of humans just doesn't give a crap about anything that's further than 10cm from the end of their noses. The opposite of world priorities being set by fewer and fewer people is not lots of good things happening, it's not…

>I personally feel happy that this effect is increasing

Well, it's all good until it isn't. If the priorities of a few people impact so many (including you) and you no longer agree with them, then what do you do?

>I hope to be the part of this small group at some point.

I think it's actually a shame that you'd need to be a part of the "small group" in order to have a voice. Ideally, we'd all have at least the capacity to participate in our world without first requiring the blessing of a handful of gatekeepers.

And, the irony is that's the thing: It's actually harder for you to make it into the small group sans the blessing of the few who are in it. For instance, where is the real democratizing effect of the Net? For a recent, specific example, look at Bitcoin. What was once a libertarian's dream has already been co-opted by the same VCs and interests such that they will now provide the services and "real infrastructure" to grow wealthy from what was once considered an almost subversive concept. Business as usual.

>majority of humans just doesn't give a crap about anything that's further than 10cm from the end of their noses

That's true, but I think that's due to the quite purposeful orientation of our society towards mass distraction, which seems to be part of an apparent desire to limit critical thought. Witness the U.S. education system which emphasizes rote-memorization and the creation of "cogs for the machine". I actually think it's endemic to the wealth/income polarization problem. That is, such a societal structure that seeks to create a consumer class that serves as mere unthinking cogs works to someone's benefit.

>Just look at internal politics of every democratic state

I'm not sure how many truly democratic states there are. The "shining example" (US) is controlled by a relative few people through special interests, insane campaign funding laws, and revolving-door civil-servants/lobbyists. Again, all of these examples point back to the very discomfort I have: the increasing concentration of power and wealth away from "the masses" into the hands of a few whose agenda and priorities shape our world.