An effective vaccine against Sars-Cov-2 and also against all other coronaviruses that, in the future, could lead to the explosion of new pandemics. It is what today we can consider the Holy Grail of virology, on which many researchers around the world are working. Especially since this pandemic started. Nearly a tipping point is a group of researchers from the University of Virginia Health System and Virginia Tech, whose vaccine candidate has shown promising results in pigs. Another advantage of the experimental vaccine is the very low cost, approximately 1 dollar per serving.
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In a study published in pre-print, therefore not yet peer-reviewed, the vaccine developed by scientists Steven L. draftsman UVA Health e Xiang-Jin Meng of Virginia Tech prevented pigs from getting sick from the swine epidemic diarrhea virus, a pig model of coronavirus infection. The vaccine was developed using an innovative approach that Zeichner said could also help prevent the common cold. Furthermore, the formulation would offer numerous benefits that could overcome major obstacles to global vaccination efforts. The vaccine, in fact, would be easy to store and transport, even in remote areas of the world, and could be produced in large quantities using existing factories.
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The platform used by the researchers was invented by Zeichner himself with the aim of accelerating the development of new vaccines. “Our new platform offers a new path to rapidly producing very low cost vaccines that can be manufactured in existing facilities around the world, which should be particularly useful for pandemic response,” says Zeichner. Now with the success of the pigs for the scientist it is double victory: a promising anti-Covid vaccine candidate and a usable platform for the development of future vaccines.
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The new platform plans to synthesize DNA which aims to “carry” a piece of the virus that can “instruct” the immune system on how to produce a protective immune response. DNA is inserted into a small circular strand of DNA called a plasmid that can reproduce within bacteria. The plasmid is then introduced into the bacteria, which in turn are “instructed” to place bits of protein on their surfaces. The technique uses common bacteria Escherichia coli, which are deprived of a large number of their genes, including those that make up part of the surface or outer membrane. This appears to substantially increase the immune system’s ability to recognize and respond to the vaccine antigen placed on the surface of the bacteria.
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To make the vaccine, the antigen-expressing bacteria are simply grown in a fermenter, just like the fermenters used in the brewing process, and then killed with a low concentration of formalin. “Currently ‘killed whole-cell’ vaccines – explains Zeichner – are widely used against deadly diseases such as cholera and whooping cough. In many low- and middle-income countries, factories are producing hundreds of millions of doses of those vaccines a year, for $ 1 or less per dose. Those factories could be adapted to produce this new vaccine. Since the technology is very similar, the cost should also be similar ”. The whole process, from identifying a potential vaccine target to producing the genetically modified bacteria that have the vaccine antigens on their surface, can happen very quickly, in just two to three weeks, making the ideal platform to respond to a pandemic.
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As for Zeichner and Meng’s Covid vaccine candidate, the approach used is unusual in that it targets a portion of the spike protein, the virus’s key to entry into the cell, which is essentially universal among coronaviruses. Specifically, the researchers made two vaccines, one designed to protect against Covid-19 and another designed to protect against the swine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV). Both are coronaviruses, but they are distant relatives. The swine epidemic diarrhea virus and SARS-CoV-2, like all coronaviruses, share many of the amino acids that make up Spike. PEDV infects pigs, causing diarrhea, vomiting and high fever, and has been a major plague for pig farmers around the world. When PEDV first appeared on farms in the United States, it killed nearly 10 percent of U.S. pigs, a swine pandemic.
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An advantage of the PEDV study in pigs is that Meng and Zeichner could study the ability of vaccines to offer protection against a coronavirus infection in its native host, in this case pigs. The other models that have been used to test Covid vaccines study SARS-CoV-2 in non-native hosts, such as monkeys or hamsters, or in mice that have been genetically modified to become infected like humans. Additionally, pigs may be the closest animal models to people other than primates. Unexpectedly, Meng and Zeichner observed that both the PEDV vaccine and the Sars-CoV-2 vaccine protected pigs from the disease caused by PEDV. The vaccines did not shield against infection, but they did protect pigs from developing severe symptoms, just like current Covid vaccines. The vaccines also triggered more vigorous immune responses in pigs. If both vaccines, the one against PEDV and Covid-19, protect pigs from disease caused by PEDV and stimulate the immune system to fight the disease, it is reasonable to think that the Covid vaccine will also protect people from severe forms of the infection .
More testing, including human studies, is now needed before this Covid-19 vaccine can be approved by the Food and Drug Administration or other regulatory agencies around the world for use in people, but the researchers are happy with the early successes of the vaccine and development platform.
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