Immunoreactivity of HCV/HBV epitopes displayed in an epitope-presenting system

Plant and insect virus-like particles: emerging nanoparticles for agricultural pest management

Virus-like particles (VLPs) represent a biodegradable, biocompatible nanomaterial made from viral coat proteins that can improve the delivery of antigens, drugs, nucleic acids, and other substances, with most applications in human and veterinary medicine. Regarding agricultural viruses, many insect and plant virus coat proteins have been shown to assemble into VLPs accurately. In addition, some plant virus-based VLPs have been used in medical studies. However, to our knowledge, the potential application of plant/insect virus-based VLPs in agriculture remains largely underexplored. This review focuses on why and how to engineer coat proteins of plant/insect viruses as functionalized VLPs, and how to exploit VLPs in agricultural pest control. The first part of the review describes four different engineering strategies for loading cargo at the inner or the outer surface of VLPs depending on the type of cargo and purpose. Second, the literature on plant and insect viruses the coat proteins of which have been confirmed to self-assemble into VLPs is reviewed. These VLPs are good candidates for developing VLP-based agricultural pest control strategies. Lastly, the concepts of plant/insect virus-based VLPs for delivering insecticidal and antiviral components (e.g., double-stranded RNA, peptides, and chemicals) are discussed, which provides future prospects of VLP application in agricultural pest control. In addition, some concerns are raised about VLP production on a large scale and the short-term resistance of hosts to VLP uptake. Overall, this review is expected to stimulate interest and research exploring plant/insect virus-based VLP applications in agricultural pest management. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry.

Synthetic biology for bioengineering virus-like particle vaccines

Vaccination is the most effective method of disease prevention and control. Many viruses and bacteria that once caused catastrophic pandemics (e.g., smallpox, poliomyelitis, measles, and diphtheria) are either eradicated or effectively controlled through routine vaccination programs. Nonetheless, vaccine manufacturing remains incredibly challenging. Viruses exhibiting high antigenic diversity and high mutation rates cannot be fairly contested using traditional vaccine production methods and complexities surrounding the manufacturing processes, which impose significant limitations. Virus-like particles (VLPs) are recombinantly produced viral structures that exhibit immunoprotective traits of native viruses but are noninfectious. Several VLPs that compositionally match a given natural virus have been developed and licensed as vaccines. Expansively, a plethora of studies now confirms that VLPs can be designed to safely present heterologous antigens from a variety of pathogens unrelated to the chosen carrier VLPs. Owing to this design versatility, VLPs offer technological opportunities to modernize vaccine supply and disease response through rational bioengineering. These opportunities are greatly enhanced with the application of synthetic biology, the redesign and construction of novel biological entities. This review outlines how synthetic biology is currently applied to engineer VLP functions and manufacturing process. Current and developing technologies for the identification of novel target-specific antigens and their usefulness for rational engineering of VLP functions (e.g., presentation of structurally diverse antigens, enhanced antigen immunogenicity, and improved vaccine stability) are described. When applied to manufacturing processes, synthetic biology approaches can also overcome specific challenges in VLP vaccine production. Finally, we address several challenges and benefits associated with the translation of VLP vaccine development into the industry.

Advances in the study of nodavirus

Nodaviruses are small bipartite RNA viruses which belong to the family of Nodaviridae. They are categorized into alpha-nodavirus, which infects insects, and beta-nodavirus, which infects fishes. Another distinct group of nodavirus infects shrimps and prawns, which has been proposed to be categorized as gamma-nodavirus. Our current review focuses mainly on recent studies performed on nodaviruses. Nodavirus can be transmitted vertically and horizontally. Recent outbreaks have been reported in China, Indonesia, Singapore and India, affecting the aquaculture industry. It also decreased mullet stock in the Caspian Sea. Histopathology and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) are used to examine the presence of nodaviruses in infected fishes and prawns. For classification, virus isolation followed by nucleotide sequencing are required. In contrast to partial sequence identification, profiling the whole transcriptome using next generation sequencing (NGS) offers a more comprehensive comparison and characterization of the virus. For rapid diagnosis of nodavirus, assays targeting the viral RNA based on reverse-transcription PCR (RT-PCR) such as microfluidic chips, reverse-transcription loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) and RT-LAMP coupled with lateral flow dipstick (RT-LAMP-LFD) have been developed. Besides viral RNA detections, diagnosis based on immunological assays such as enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), immunodot and Western blotting have also been reported. In addition, immune responses of fish and prawn are also discussed. Overall, in fish, innate immunity, cellular type I interferon immunity and humoral immunity cooperatively prevent nodavirus infections, whereas prawns and shrimps adopt different immune mechanisms against nodavirus infections, through upregulation of superoxide anion, prophenoloxidase, superoxide dismutase (SOD), crustin, peroxinectin, anti-lipopolysaccharides and heat shock proteins (HSP). Potential vaccines for fishes and prawns based on inactivated viruses, recombinant proteins or DNA, either delivered through injection, oral feeding or immersion, are also discussed in detail. Lastly, a comprehensive review on nodavirus virus-like particles (VLPs) is presented. In recent years, studies on prawn nodavirus are mainly focused on Macrobrachium rosenbergii nodavirus (MrNV). Recombinant MrNV VLPs have been produced in prokaryotic and eukaryotic expression systems. Their roles as a nucleic acid delivery vehicle, a platform for vaccine development, a molecular tool for mechanism study and in solving the structures of MrNV are intensively discussed.

Nodavirus-based biological container for targeted delivery system

Biological containers such as virus-like particles (VLPs) have gained increasing interest in the fields of gene therapy and vaccine development. Several virus-based materials have been studied, but the toxicity, biodistribution, and immunology of these systems still require extensive investigation. The specific goal of this review is to provide information about nodaviruses, which are causative infectious agents of insects and aquatic animals, but not humans. By understanding the structure and biophysical properties of such viruses, further chemical or genetic modification for novel nanocarriers could be developed. Therefore, their application for therapeutic purposes, particularly in humans, is of great interest.

A new rotavirus VP6-based foreign epitope presenting vector and immunoreactivity of VP4 epitope chimeric proteins

The VP6, the group antigenic rotavirus (RV), is highly conserved and the most abundant, constituting about 39% of the viral structure proteins by weight. The high degree of identity (>87%-99%) in the primary amino acid sequences suggests VP6-based vaccines could potentially provide heterotypic protection. Although some efforts have been made toward producing recombinant rotavirus VP6 vaccines, the native VP6 is still unsatisfactory as an optimal vaccine. The major neutralizing antigenic epitopes that exist on VP4 or VP7 are not on the native VP6, and as a vector the native VP6 lacks insertion sites that can be used for insertion of foreign epitopes. In this study, a new foreign epitope presenting system using VP6 as a vector (VP6F) was constructed on the outer surface of the vector six sites that could be used for insertion of the foreign epitopes created. Using this system, three VP6-based VP4 epitope chimeric proteins were constructed. Results showed that these chimeric proteins reacted with anti-VP6 and -VP4 antibodies, and elicited antibodies against VP6 and VP4 in guinea pigs. Antibodies against VP6F or antibodies against the chimeric proteins neutralized RV Wa and SA11 infection in vitro. It is optimistic that the limitation for using the native VP6 as a vaccine candidate or vector will be solved with our proposed approach. It is expected that this VP6-based epitope presenting system and the VP6-based VP4 epitope chimeric proteins will be valuable for and contribute to the development of novel RV vaccines and vaccine vectors.

Newly discovered insect RNA viruses in China

Insects are a group of arthropods and the largest group of animals on Earth, with over one million species described to date. Like other life forms, insects suffer from viruses that cause disease and death. Viruses that are pathogenic to beneficial insects cause dramatic economic losses on agriculture. In contrast, viruses that are pathogenic to insect pests can be exploited as attractive biological control agents. All of these factors have led to an explosion in the amount of research into insect viruses in recent years, generating impressive quantities of information on the molecular and cellular biology of these viruses. Due to the wide variety of insect viruses, a better understanding of these viruses will expand our overall knowledge of their virology. Here, we review studies of several newly discovered RNA insect viruses in China.

Viral nanoparticles and virus-like particles: platforms for contemporary vaccine design

Current vaccines that provide protection against infectious diseases have primarily relied on attenuated or inactivated pathogens. Virus‐like particles (VLPs), comprised of capsid proteins that can initiate an immune response but do not include the genetic material required for replication, promote immunogenicity and have been developed and approved as vaccines in some cases. In addition, many of these VLPs can be used as molecular platforms for genetic fusion or chemical attachment of heterologous antigenic epitopes. This approach has been shown to provide protective immunity against the foreign epitopes in many cases. A variety of VLPs and virus‐based nanoparticles are being developed for use as vaccines and epitope platforms. These particles have the potential to increase efficacy of current vaccines as well as treat diseases for which no effective vaccines are available. WIREs Nanomed Nanobiotechnol 2011 3 174–196 DOI: 10.1002/wnan.119

This article is categorized under: 1

Therapeutic Approaches and Drug Discovery > Nanomedicine for Infectious Disease

Recent insights into the biology and biomedical applications of Flock House virus

Flock House virus (FHV) is a nonenveloped, icosahedral insect virus whose genome consists of two molecules of single-stranded, positive-sense RNA. FHV is a highly tractable system for studies on a variety of basic aspects of RNA virology. In this review, recent studies on the replication of FHV genomic and subgenomic RNA are discussed, including a landmark study on the ultrastructure and molecular organization of FHV replication complexes. In addition, we show how research on FHV B2, a potent suppressor of RNA silencing, resulted in significant insights into antiviral immunity in insects. We also explain how the specific packaging of the bipartite genome of this virus is not only controlled by specific RNA-protein interactions but also by coupling between RNA replication and genome recognition. Finally, applications for FHV as an epitopepresenting system are described with particular reference to its recent use for the development of a novel anthrax antitoxin and vaccine.

Expression and immunoreactivity of HCV/HBV epitopes

AIM: To develop the epitope-based vaccines to prevent Hepatitis C virus (HCV) / Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infections.

METHODS: The HCV core epitopes C1 STNPKPQRKTKRNTNRRPQD (residuals aa2-21) and C2 VKFPGGGQIVGGVYLLPRR (residuals aa22-40), envelope epitope E GHRMAWDMMMNWSP (residuals aa315-328) and HBsAg epitope S CTTPAQGNSMFPSCCCTKPTDGNC (residuals aa124-147) were displayed in five different sites of the flock house virus capsid protein as a vector, and expressed in E. coli cells (pET-3 system). Immunoreactivity of the epitopes with anti-HCV and anti-HBV antibodies in the serum from hepatitis C and hepatitis B patients were determined.

RESULTS: The expressed chimeric protein carrying the HCV epitopes C1, C2, E (two times), L3C1-I2E-L1C2-L2E could react with anti-HCV antibodies. The expressed chimeric protein carrying the HBV epitopes S, I3S could react with anti-HBs antibodies. The expressed chimeric proteins carrying the HCV epitopes C1, C2, E plus HBV epitope S, L3C1-I2E-L1C2-L2E-I3S could react with anti-HCV and anti-HBs antibodies.

CONCLUSION: These epitopes have highly specific and sensitive immunoreaction and are useful in the development of epitope-based vaccines.