Abstract
Hepatitis A virus (HAV) and hepatitis E virus (HEV) are causative agents of acute viral hepatitis transmitted via the fecal–oral route. Both viruses place a heavy burden on the public health and economy of developing countries. To test the possibility that HAV could be used as an expression vector for the development of a combination vaccine against hepatitis A and E infections, recombinant HAV-HEp148 was created as a vector to express an HEV neutralization epitope (HEp148) located at aa 459–606 of the HEV capsid protein. The recombinant virus expressed the HEp148 protein in a partially dimerized state in HAV-susceptible cells. Immunization with the HAV-HEp148 virus induced a strong HAV- and HEV-specific immune response in mice. Thus, the present study demonstrates a novel approach to the development of a combined hepatitis A and E vaccine.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 260 |
| Journal | Viruses |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue number | 9 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 15.09.2017 |
Funding
Conflicts of Interest: No conflicting financial interests exist. This work was supported by grant (2016-I2M-1-019) from the CAMS Initiative for Innovative Medicine and Science and Technology Plan Project of Yunnan Province (2014BC008; 2016FB034). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. No additional external funding was received for this study.
