Reverse Vaccinology Approach for a Potential Rhinovirus Vaccine

Background: Rhinoviruses (RVs) represent the most important aetiological agents of the common cold and areresponsible for about two-thirds of acute exacerbations of chronic bronchitis, asthma, and chronic obstructivepulmonary disease (COPD) in both children and adults. This study aimed to design a pan-serotypic vaccinecapable of inducing cross-reactive antibodies against most of the RV by using a reverse Vaccinology approach.Methods: Bioinformatics analysis was carried out to characterise the capsid proteins (VP۱, VP۲, VP۳, and VP۴)of all known RV serotypes and to predict potential immune motifs. Conserved motifs consisting at least ninemerscommon across all RV-A or B serotypes were selected and synthesized chemically. Four tagged full-lengthgenes coding the capsid proteins of an ideal strain (HRV-۷۴), VP۱, VP۲, VP۳, and VP۴ were constructed andcloned in vitro. Upon expression , the purified recombinant proteins were also administered subcutaneously toother groups of rabbits. The responses and cross-reactivity of the specific immunoglobulin M (IgM) and G (IgG)to the peptides, proteins, and whole viruses were measured.Results: The obtained anti-peptide antibodies exhibited a cross-neutralizing activity for different RV strainsin vitro. Antibodies raised to the synthetic peptides exhibited cross-reactivity against the correspondingrecombinant proteins and antigenically distinct RV strains coated on plates via ELISA assay.Conclusions: The study findings indicated that the peptides corresponding to the conserved region of the RVcapsid proteins were potent immunogenic; moreover, the findings showed that their combination was crucialfor extending the cross-protection against variant RVs.

کلیدواژه ها:

Antibodies ، Cross-protection ، Reverse vaccinology ، Rhinovirus ، Vaccine