Development of a new way to create vaccines

Michael Pravica is organizing this fundraiser.

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I am a professor of physics at UNLV who has been developing a new field of science I call useful hard x-ray photochemistry where I harness the powerful properties of energetic x-rays to initiate novel chemistry. I realized that I can use my patented methods to possibly create high quality vaccines by using tuned x-rays to selectively damage the genetic material (DNA/RNA) inside a virus and leave the protein coat (capsid) intact so that it will be the best possible/least altered vaccine. Though I have been trying for the past three months to get funding for my project, I have been unable to do so and am seeking help from the public. I would like to perform a proof-of-principle series of tests using high energy x-rays produced at the Canadian Light Source (CLS) and Argonne National Laboratory's Advanced Photon Source (APS) . I have been in contact with scientists at these facilities and they agree that these studies are potentially "paradigm shifting" but they have never studied "live" viruses before (!) and need time to develop safety protocols. Thus, I will first perform remote experiments by irradiating nucleic acids (DNA/RNA building blocks of all life including "live" viruses) to optimize the energies to damage these building blocks and then proceed at some point to irradiate live viruses when I can get approval to irradiate them. A synchrotron would be the easiest venue for me as I need to be able to easily tune these x-rays and a large flux would help me more rapidly determine the resonant energies I need to damage the viruses.
I have already been informed that I will be granted remote beamtime at the CLS for my initial remote experiments but sadly, I have no funding whatsoever for this research. I have a team of three undergraduate students, one graduate student and one former postdoc who is eager to rejoin my group - even for no pay. Two of the students are volunteering in my lab because they are so excited about this work. I am seeking any funds to 1. purchase nucleic acids (e.g. cytosine and adenosine), metalloproteins, solvents, salts, kapton capillary tubes (to confine the samples to be irradiated at the CLS), labware, viruses (e.g. lambda bacteriophages and the tobacco mosaic virus), and hosts (bacteria, tobacco plants, etc) 2. shipping costs to send my samples to be irradiated to these facilities and to be returned to UNLV 3. salaries for my students (say $10/hour), 4. travel expenses to the beamlines when they open likely in August or in the Fall (typically $1k/person/trip).
I am hoping to start experiments at the CLS would be likely occurring in the second half of July. Also, I will apply for beamtime at the APS which will also likely start opening for onsite experiments in August. The unfortunate aspect here is that I have been approved for extensive beamtime at the CLS which went through scientific peer-review, but don't have sufficient funds to do what I need to do to make my dream of developing vaccines using useful hard x-ray photochemistry a reality.
I would like to mention that my idea is at the intersection of biology/virology, chemistry, and physics and though science is best where different fields overlap, it is often difficult to find funding for these out-of-the-box ideas in part because science funding has take a big hit in this nation and science has become more incremental (instead of truly transformative) of late as program managers are more fearful of funding "risky" ideas despite the fact that our nation has benefited and continues to benefit by the amazing miracles derived from this kind of ground-breaking scientific inquiry for our economy, well being and national security.
Any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you!
Professor Michael Pravica
"Scientist!" on the No Script show produced by Bleacher Report.
(I have included a sketch of the idea, a television news segment discussing my idea, a short clip I filmed some years ago while doing experiments at the APS, an essay I wrote about the difficulties of finding funding to work on the COVID vaccine and my UNLV website).