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Viral diseases

Zeroing in on RSV vaccine design

Nature Reviews Drug Discovery volume 13, page 17 (2014)Cite this article

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Severe disease caused by RSV in at-risk infants may be prevented by using the marketed prophylactic palivizumab, which is a monoclonal antibody that inhibits an epitope at the antigenic site II present on both the pre-fusion and post-fusion conformation of the RSV fusion (F) glycoprotein (a trimeric glycoprotein used by the virus to enter host cells via membrane fusion). However, the passive immunization provided by this antibody does not last from season to season and it is very costly.

More recently, RSV-neutralizing antibodies elicited by natural infection (such as D25) have been found to be substantially more potent than palivizumab. The target of these antibodies is the antigenic site zero (Ø), which is a metastable site located at the membrane-distal apex of the pre-fusion RSV F glycoprotein.

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References

  1. McLellan, J. S. et al. Structure-based design of a fusion glycoprotein vaccine for respiratory syncytial virus. Science 342, 592–598 (2013)

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  1. Sarah Crunkhorn
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Crunkhorn, S. Zeroing in on RSV vaccine design. Nat Rev Drug Discov 13, 17 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrd4207

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