Epitope screening and vaccine molecule design of PRRSV GP3 and GP5 protein based on immunoinformatics

Abstract

Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) is a respiratory disease in pigs that causes severe economic losses. Currently, live PRRSV vaccines are commonly used but fail to prevent PRRS outbreaks and reinfection. Inactivated PRRSV vaccines have poor immunogenicity, making PRRSV a significant threat to swine health globally. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop an effective PRRSV vaccine. This study used immunoinformatics to predict, screen, design and construct a candidate vaccine that fused B‐cell epitopes, CTL‐ and HTL‐dominant protective epitopes of PRRSV strain's GP3 and GP5 proteins. The study identified 12 B‐cell epitopes, 6 CTL epitopes and 5 HTL epitopes of GP3 and GP5 proteins. The candidate vaccine was constructed with 50S ribosomal protein L7/L1 molecular adjuvant, which has antigenicity, solubility, stability, non‐allergenicity and a high affinity for its target receptor, TLR‐3. The C‐ImmSim immunostimulation results showed significant increases in cellular and humoral responses (B cells and T cells) and production of TGF‐β, IL‐2, IL‐10, IFN‐γ and IL‐12. The constructed vaccine was stable and immunogenic, and it can effectively induce strong T‐cell and B‐cell immune responses against PRRSV. Therefore, it is a promising candidate vaccine for controlling and preventing PRRSV outbreaks.

Development of a Ferritin Protein Nanoparticle Vaccine with PRRSV GP5 Protein

“…The GP5 protein is a major structural component of PRRSV, and possesses notable immunogenicity. It has the capacity to induce the production of neutralizing antibodies [ 17 , 40 , 41 , 42 ]. However, vaccines based on the original GP5 protein generally suffer from the defect of being unable to induce high levels of neutralizing antibodies [ 43 , 44 , 45 ].…”

“…Although GP5 is considered to be an ideal target for the design of novel vaccines, some experimental vaccines based on the expression of the native GP5 protein, such as subunit vaccines, viral vector vaccines, DNA vaccines, and so on, often fail to induce higher neutralizing antibodies [18,[20][21][22][23][24][25]. Additionally, there is also a nonneutralizing decoy epitope (aa 27-31) located upstream of the neutralizing epitope GP5B (aa [37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45], which may hinder the recognition of the GP5B epitope and the subsequent development of neutralizing antibodies [15]. Therefore, we replaced the decoy epitope with the GP5B epitope and named the mutant gene GP5m.…”

Synthetic Peptides Elicit Humoral Response against Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome Virus in Swine

“…Moreover, GP5 is highly immunogenic, making it significant in the diagnosis, prevention, and control of PRRSV [ 16 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 ]. Effective anti-PRRSV immunity may be attained by exposing immunogenic epitopes to induce efficient innate and adaptive immune responses mediated by specific antibodies, cytokines, and T-cell responses [ 17 , 40 ]. Compared to commercial vaccines, peptide vaccines do not contain nucleic acid substances; therefore, they are considered safer [ 41 ].…”