AUTHOR=Persson Gry , Restori Katherine H. , Emdrup Julie Hincheli , Schussek Sophie , Klausen Michael Schantz , Nicol McKayla J. , Katkere Bhuvana , Rønø Birgitte , Kirimanjeswara Girish , Sørensen Anders Bundgaard 

TITLE=DNA immunization with in silico predicted T-cell epitopes protects against lethal SARS-CoV-2 infection in K18-hACE2 mice

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Immunology

VOLUME=Volume 14 - 2023

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/immunology/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2023.1166546

DOI=10.3389/fimmu.2023.1166546

ISSN=1664-3224

ABSTRACT=The global SARS-CoV-2 pandemic caused significant global disruption, both socially and economically, despite highly effective vaccines being developed at an unprecedented speed. As the first licensed vaccines only target single B-cell antigens, antigenic drift could lead to loss of efficacy against emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants. Improvement of the B-cell vaccines by including multiple T-cell epitopes could potentially solve this challenge. Here we show that in silico predicted MHC class I/II ligands induced robust T-cell responses and protected against severe disease in genetically modified K18-hACE2/BL6 mice susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection.