Editorial: From Bench to Clinic: Novel Vaccines and Therapeutics – "Success Stories"

Arundhathi Venkatasubramaniam^1*Nathan K. Archer^2*

• ¹Department of Pediatrics, University of Maryland Baltimore, Baltimore, United States
• ²Department of Dermatology, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, United States

The manuscript "Vaccination with parasite-specific TcTASV proteins combined with recombinant baculovirus as a delivery platform protects against acute and chronic Trypanosoma cruzi infection" proves to be promising in delivering a vaccine candidate against Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes Chagas disease. The authors discuss combination of parasite specific proteins alongside a baculovirus platform used as a delivery displaying one such protein on the capsid. The combination works successfully, with vaccinated mice surviving a lethal challenge with T. cruzi and presenting reduced parasitic load in chronic infection. It remains to be seen as to the success of the vaccine against other strains of T. cruzi as well as the durability of the immune response (Simone Frédérique Brenière, 2016).Animal models are essential and functional during the discovery and development phases for a vaccine, but eventually all vaccines must prove their mettle in humans. Manuscripts "Effectiveness of two-dose vs. one-dose varicella vaccine in children in Shanghai, China: a prospective cohort study" and "TRAIL and IP-10 dynamics in pregnant women post COVID-19 vaccination: associations with neutralizing antibody potency" are both studies in humans, although with differences. The former is a clinical trial that compares the effectiveness of one vs two doses of varicella vaccine in children in Shanghai China and concludes that two doses are more effective than one. The latter manuscript studies the dynamics of biomarkers for COVID-19 infection -TRAIL and IP-10 in pregnant women post COVID-19 vaccination as well as neutralizing antibody inhibition against COVID strains. These two manuscripts are also of special significance considering they study the course of vaccination in children and pregnant women, both vulnerable groups that merit additional analysis (Marshall, 2016;Örtqvist, 2010).Although the development of a successful vaccine represents a significant challenge, these articles all bring forward ways in which targets/biomarkers (S. Sohail Ahmed, 2011)can be identified that enable scientists and clinicians the tools to develop vaccines and therapeutics. Finally, vaccine and therapeutic research is an exciting field -rapidly evolving, harnessing new technologies to help reduce the burden of several diseases or to eliminate them entirely from our communities.