Protective immunity to lethal challenge of the 1918 pandemic influenza virus by vaccination.

ABSTRACT: The remarkable infectivity and virulence of the 1918 influenza virus resulted in an unprecedented pandemic, raising the question of whether it is possible to develop protective immunity to this virus and whether immune evasion may have contributed to its spread. Here, we report that the highly lethal 1918 virus is susceptible to immune protection by a preventive vaccine, and we define its mechanism of action. Immunization with plasmid expression vectors encoding hemagglutinin (HA) elicited potent CD4 and CD8 cellular responses as well as neutralizing antibodies. Antibody specificity and titer were defined by a microneutralization and a pseudotype assay that could assess antibody specificity without the need for high-level biocontainment. This pseudotype inhibition assay can define evolving

SUBMITTER: Kong WP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1613227 | biostudies-literature | 2006 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature