Balancing the influenza neuraminidase and hemagglutinin responses by exchanging the vaccine virus backbone.

ABSTRACT: Virions are a common antigen source for many viral vaccines. One limitation to using virions is that the antigen abundance is determined by the content of each protein in the virus. This caveat especially applies to viral-based influenza vaccines where the low abundance of the neuraminidase (NA) surface antigen remains a bottleneck for improving the NA antibody response. Our systematic analysis using recent H1N1 vaccine antigens demonstrates that the NA to hemagglutinin (HA) ratio in virions can be improved by exchanging the viral backbone internal genes, especially the segment encoding the polymerase PB1 subunit. The purified inactivated virions with higher NA content show a more spherical morphology, a shift in the balance between the HA receptor binding and NA receptor release functions

SUBMITTER: Gao J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8084346 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature