Affiliations 

  • 1 Department of Pathology, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Universiti Putra Malaysia, UPM Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia
  • 2 Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, Universiti Putra Malaysia, UPM Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia
  • 3 Department of Marine Biotechnology, China-ASEAN College of Marine Sciences, Xiamen University Malaysia, Jalan Sunsuria, Bandar Sunsuria, Sepang 43900, Selangor, Malaysia
  • 4 Institute of Bioscience, Universiti Putra Malaysia, UPM Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia
  • 5 Department of Pathology, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Universiti Putra Malaysia, UPM Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia. klho@upm.edu.my
Vaccines (Basel), 2019 08 19;7(3).
PMID: 31430965 DOI: 10.3390/vaccines7030091

Abstract

Current seasonal influenza A virus (IAV) vaccines are strain-specific and require annual reconstitution to accommodate the viral mutations. Mismatches between the vaccines and circulating strains often lead to high morbidity. Hence, development of a universal influenza A vaccine targeting all IAV strains is urgently needed. In the present study, the protective efficacy and immune responses induced by the extracellular domain of Matrix 2 protein (M2e) displayed on the virus-like particles of Macrobrachium rosenbergii nodavirus (NvC-M2ex3) were investigated in BALB/c mice. NvC-M2ex3 was demonstrated to be highly immunogenic even in the absence of adjuvants. Higher anti-M2e antibody titers corresponded well with increased survival, reduced immunopathology, and morbidity of the infected BALB/c mice. The mice immunized with NvC-M2ex3 exhibited lower H1N1 and H3N2 virus replication in the respiratory tract and the vaccine activated the production of different antiviral cytokines when they were challenged with H1N1 and H3N2. Collectively, these results suggest that NvC-M2ex3 could be a potential universal influenza A vaccine.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.