Engineering of a plant-produced virus-like particle to improve the display of the Plasmodium falciparum Pfs25 antigen and transmission-blocking activity of the vaccine candidate

This study demonstrates an improved version of the virus-like particle antigen display molecule by eliminating known protease sites from the prior A85 variant. This re-engineered molecule, termed B29, displays three times the number of Pfs25 antigens per virus-like particle compared to the original Pfs25 virus-like particle. An improved purification scheme was also developed, resulting in a substantially higher yield and improved purity. The molecule was evaluated in a mouse model and found to induce improved transmission-blocking activity at lower doses and longer durations than the original molecule.PMID:36585278 | DOI:10.1016/j.vaccine.2022.12.048

Source: Vaccine - December 30, 2022 Category: Allergy & Immunology Authors: Stephen Tottey Yoko Shoji R Mark Jones Konstantin Musiychuk Jessica A Chichester Kazutoyo Miura Luwen Zhou Shwu-Maan Lee Jordan Plieskatt Yimin Wu Carole A Long Stephen J Streatfield Vidadi Yusibov Source Type: research