New Vaccine Candidates Show Commitment to Covid-19, Research Results

The team experimented with two potential antigens known to be used by the novel coronavirus to cause infection, their surface spike proteins and receptor-binding domains. (Image diagram)

Experimental vaccines that stimulate the production of certain proteins may be effective against the novel Coronavirus Because of that COVID-19 (new coronavirus infectious disease) (# If there is no character limit, add parentheses when first appearing, According to a study done in mice.

Scientists at Ohio State University in the United States engineered a natural cellular process to raise the levels of two proteins that the virus uses to infect other cells and packaged protein-enhancing instructions into nanoparticles. Injected into mouse.

Within a month, mice developed antibodies to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, according to a study published in the journal Advanced Materials on Monday.

The technology involves changing certain sequences of messenger RNA, a molecule that translates genetic information into functional proteins, researchers said.

These sequences are not translated into proteins, but researchers have altered their structure to promote higher than normal levels of protein.

Sequences are known as untranslated regions, or UTRs.

A rapidly tracked Phase 3 clinical trial of the COVID-19 vaccine candidate is underway, but Yizhou Dong, an associate professor at Ohio State University, said his lab platform provides a potential alternative. It was

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“It would be great if the current vaccine worked well. If the field needs this, it’s an option. The vaccine works as expected and it can be expanded very quickly. ..

“For now, this is a proof of concept. We have demonstrated that we can optimize the sequence of messenger RNAs to improve protein production, generate antigens and induce antibodies to those specific antigens,” he said. It was

The heart of this approach is typical of vaccine development. Find ways to use fragments of the pathogen’s structure to generate an antigen, a foreign substance that provokes an appropriate immune response, and safely introduce it into the body.

But Don said the approach takes messenger RNA UTRs to a new level in antigen design.

His lab uses two UTRs that make the beginning and end of protein assembly a bookend, acting as a regulator of that process and affecting how the resulting protein interacts with other proteins. It was

According to researchers, the UTR itself is a sequence of nucleotides, the molecules that make up RNA and DNA.

“Our application sought to optimize the UTR to improve the protein production process. We wanted to produce as much protein as possible, so we wanted to induce antibodies to the virus. You can give a small amount of messenger RNA that produces enough antigen.

The team experimented with two potential antigens known to be used by the novel coronavirus to cause infection, their surface spike proteins and receptor-binding domains.

Domains are the building blocks of spike proteins used by viruses to enter host cells and are a necessary step in making copies of themselves.

The researchers said both were used in other SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidates.

After manipulating the messenger RNAs of these two proteins, the team encapsulated them in lipid nanoparticles previously developed in Dong’s lab.

They injected mice with the vaccine and given boosters two weeks later.

One month after the first injection, mouse immune cells took up the antigens of two proteins and developed antibodies to them.

“It takes some time for the immune system to process the antigen and cause the cells to produce antibodies. In this study, antibodies were detected after 30 days,” Don added.

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