Design of a novel multiple epitope-based vaccine: An immunoinformatics approach to combat SARS-CoV-2 strains

Abstract

Background Since the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak in December 2019 in Wuhan, China, the virus has infected more than 135 million individuals across the world due to its human-to-human transmission. The USA is the most affected country having more than 58 million cases till date. Sudden high fever, pneumonia and organ failure have been observed in infected individuals. Objectives In the current situation of emerging viral disease, there is no specific vaccine, or any therapeutics available for SARS-CoV-2, there is a dire need to design a potential vaccine to combat the virus by developing immunity in the population. The purpose of present study was to develop a potential vaccine by targeting B and T-cell epitopes using bioinformatics approaches. Methods B and T-cell epitopes prediction from novel M protein-SARS-CoV-2 for the development of a unique multiple epitope vaccine applying bioinformatics approaches. These epitopes were analyzed and selected for their immunogenicity, antigenicity scores, and toxicity in correspondence to their ability to trigger immune response. In combination to epitopes, best multi-epitope of potential immunogenic property was constructed. The epitopes were joined using EAAAK, AAY and GPGPG linkers. Results The constructed vaccine showed good results of worldwide population coverage and promising immune response. This constructed vaccine was subjected to in-silico immune simulations by C-ImmSim. Chimeric protein construct was cloned into PET28a (+) vector for expression study in Escherichia coli using snapgene. Conclusion This vaccine design proved effective in various computer-based immune response analysis as well as showed good population coverage. This study is solely dependent on developing M protein-based vaccine, and these in silico findings would be a breakthrough in the development of an effective vaccine to eradicate SARS-CoV-2 globally.

A Vaccine Construction against COVID-19-Associated Mucormycosis Contrived with Immunoinformatics-Based Scavenging of Potential Mucoralean Epitopes

“…An important aspect of designing any vaccine construct is to ensure its antigenicity, nonallergenicity, and nontoxicity. Results for all three aspects were consistent with that of Naveed et al (2021), who worked on antigenicity analyses throughout [ 25 ]. This study utilized a similar approach, and the individual antigenicity and allergenicity of all the epitopes were processed for the selection of final epitopes.…”

“…However, stabilizing the structure improved the docking analyses 10-fold. These findings on the importance of structure stability were found consistent with Naveed et al (2021) [ 25 ] and Abraham Peele et al (2020) [ 28 ] and improved the quality of the vaccine construct. These results point to a potential agent for the precautionary therapeutics against mucormycosis.…”

“…Tarang et al (2020) used a TLR4 agonist to enhance the fungal vaccine activity; however, this adjuvant destabilized our protein structure [ 26 ]. Utilizing the adjuvant used by Naveed et al (2021) helped us achieve the desired stability and did not affect the antigenicity [ 25 ]. The reason why the adjuvant used by Tarang et al (2021) did not work is not yet understood [ 26 ].…”

“…An L7/L12 50S ribosomal protein, following Naveed et al (2021), was used as an adjuvant at the N-terminal of the vaccine construct as it significantly improves the recognition by Toll-like receptors and can polarize CD4 + cells and activate naïve T cells [ 25 ]. Three linkers, successfully utilized by Naveed et al (2021) [ 25 ] and Elamin Elhasan et al (2021) [ 20 ], were used to adjoin the epitopes of the two target proteins together. Polyhistidine tags were added at the C-terminal of the vaccine to keep the structure stable.…”

EpiCurator: an immunoinformatic workflow to predict and prioritize SARS-CoV-2 epitopes

“…This work highlights the peptide-based vaccine described in several studies about SARS-CoV-2 vaccines ( Malonis, Lai & Vergnolle, 2020 ; Chakraborty et al, 2020 ; Crooke et al, 2020 ; Fatoba et al, 2021 ; Naveed et al, 2021 ). Currently, ten from 33 vaccines in phase 3 clinical trial, and four from 22 approved vaccines have a peptide-based design ( McGill COVID19 Vaccine Tracker Team, 2021 ).…”