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Virology

A quick fix for avian influenza?

Nature Reviews Microbiology volume 4, pages 164–165 (2006)Cite this article

Given that conventional strategies for influenza vaccine production are unlikely to be suitable for large-scale vaccine production during a pandemic, there is great interest in alternative strategies such as reverse genetics. Now, Andrea Gambotto and colleagues report on another alternative strategy — the construction of a recombinant DNA vaccine based on an adenovirus vector.

The sequences of the full-length haemagglutinin (HA) gene from an H5N1 strain (A/Vietnam/1203/2004) that was isolated in Vietnam during the 2003–2005 outbreak and the genes encoding the two HA subunits were all codon optimized to boost expression in mammalian cells, and then cloned into attenuated adenovirus vectors and cultivated in a mammalian cell line. The team were able to construct the recombinant vaccines within 36 days of obtaining the HA sequence.

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References

ORIGINAL RESEARCH PAPERS

  1. Gao, W. et al. Protection of mice and poultry from lethal H5N1 avian influenza virus through adenovirus-based immunization. J. Virol. 80, 1959–1964 (2006)

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  2. Hoelscher, M. A. et al. Development of adenoviral-vector-based pandemic influenza vaccine against antigenically distinct human H5N1 strains in mice. Lancet 2 Feb 2006 (10.1016/S0140-6736(06)68076-8)

FURTHER READING

  1. Horimoto, T & Kawaoka, Y. Influenza: lessons from past pandemics, warnings from current incidents. Nature Rev. Microbiol. 3, 591–600 (2005)

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  2. Wood, J. M. & Robertson, J. S. From lethal virus to life-saving vaccine: developing inactivated vaccines for pandemic influenza. Nature Rev. Microbiol. 2, 842–847 (2004)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

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Authors
  1. Sheilagh Molloy
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Molloy, S. A quick fix for avian influenza?. Nat Rev Microbiol 4, 164–165 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrmicro1378

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrmicro1378

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