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Synergistic Immunity and Protection in Mice by Co-Immunization with DNA Vaccines Encoding the Spike Protein and Other Structural Proteins of SARS-CoV-2

The emergence of new variants of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has generated recurring worldwide infection outbreaks. These highly mutated variants reduce the effectiveness of current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines, which are designed to target only the s...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Chen, Jinni, Huang, Baoying, Deng, Yao, Wang, Wen, Zhai, Chengcheng, Han, Di, Wang, Na, Zhao, Ying, Zhai, Desheng, Tan, Wenjie
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9967269/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36851120
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/vaccines11020243
Descripción
Sumario:The emergence of new variants of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has generated recurring worldwide infection outbreaks. These highly mutated variants reduce the effectiveness of current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines, which are designed to target only the spike (S) protein of the original virus. Except for the S of SARS-CoV-2, the immunoprotective potential of other structural proteins (nucleocapsid, N; envelope, E; membrane, M) as vaccine target antigens is still unclear and worthy of investigation. In this study, synthetic DNA vaccines encoding four SARS-CoV-2 structural proteins (pS, pN, pE, and pM) were developed, and mice were immunized with three doses via intramuscular injection and electroporation. Notably, co-immunization with two DNA vaccines that expressed the S and N proteins induced higher neutralizing antibodies and was more effective in reducing the SARS-CoV-2 viral load than the S protein alone in mice. In addition, pS co-immunization with either pN or pE + pM induced a higher S protein-specific cellular immunity after three immunizations and caused milder histopathological changes than pS alone post-challenge. The role of the conserved structural proteins of SARS-CoV-2, including the N/E/M proteins, should be investigated further for their applications in vaccine design, such as mRNA vaccines.