Cross-protection among lethal H5N2 influenza viruses induced by DNA vaccine to the hemagglutinin (original) (raw)

A Single Electroporation Delivery of a DNA Vaccine Containing the Hemagglutinin Gene of Asian H5N1 Avian Influenza Virus Generated a Protective Antibody Response in Chickens against a North American Virus Strain

Clinical and Vaccine Immunology, 2013

Protection against the avian influenza (AI) H5N1 virus is suspected to be mainly conferred by the presence of antibodies directed against the hemagglutinin (HA) protein of the virus. A single electroporation delivery of 100 or 250 μg of a DNA vaccine construct, pCAG-HA, carrying the HA gene of strain A/Hanoi/30408/2005 (H5N1), in chickens led to the development of anti-HA antibody response in 16 of 17 immunized birds, as measured by a hemagglutination inhibition (HI) test, competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (cELISA), and an indirect ELISA. Birds vaccinated by electroporation ( n = 11) were protected from experimental AI challenge with strain A/chicken/Pennsylvania/1370/1/1983 (H5N2) as judged by low viral load, absence of clinical symptoms, and absence of mortality ( n = 11). In contrast, only two out of 10 birds vaccinated with the same vaccine dose (100 or 250 μg) but without electroporation developed antibodies. These birds showed high viral loads and significant morbi...

Multivalent HA DNA Vaccination Protects against Highly Pathogenic H5N1 Avian Influenza Infection in Chickens and Mice

PLOS ONE, 2008

Background: Sustained outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 in avian species increase the risk of reassortment and adaptation to humans. The ability to contain its spread in chickens would reduce this threat and help maintain the capacity for egg-based vaccine production. While vaccines offer the potential to control avian disease, a major concern of current vaccines is their potency and inability to protect against evolving avian influenza viruses. Methodology / Principal Findings: The ability of DNA vaccines encoding hemagglutinin (HA) proteins from different HPAI H5N1 serotypes was evaluated for its ability to elicit neutralizing antibodies and to protect against homologous and heterologous HPAI H5N1 strain challenge in mice and chickens after DNA immunization by needle and syringe or with a pressure injection device. These vaccines elicited antibodies that neutralized multiple strains of HPAI H5N1 when given in combinations containing up to 10 HAs. The response was dose-dependent, and breadth was determined by the choice of the influenza virus HA in the vaccine. Monovalent and trivalent HA vaccines were tested first in mice and conferred protection against lethal H5N1 A/Vietnam/1203/2004 challenge 68 weeks after vaccination. In chickens, protection was observed against heterologous strains of HPAI H5N1 after vaccination with a trivalent H5 serotype DNA vaccine with doses as low as 5 mg DNA given twice either by intramuscular needle injection or with a needle-free device. Conclusions/Significance: DNA vaccines offer a generic approach to influenza virus immunization applicable to multiple animal species. In addition, the ability to substitute plasmids encoding different strains enables rapid adaptation of the vaccine to newly evolving field isolates.

Protection against diverse highly pathogenic H5 avian influenza viruses in chickens immunized with a recombinant fowlpox vaccine containing an H5 avian influenza hemagglutinin gene insert

Vaccine, 2000

A recombinant fowlpox vaccine with an H5 hemagglutinin gene insert protected chickens against clinical signs and death following challenge by nine dierent highly pathogenic H5 avian in¯uenza viruses. The challenge viruses had 87.3 to 100% deduced hemagglutinin amino acid sequence similarity with the recombinant vaccine, and represented diversely geographic and spatial backgrounds; i.e. isolated from four dierent continents over a 38 year period. The recombinant vaccine reduced detectable infection rates and shedding titers by some challenge viruses. There was a signi®cant positive correlation in hemagglutinin sequence similarity between challenge viruses and vaccine, and the ability to reduce titers of challenge virus isolated from the oropharynx (r s =0.783, P = 0.009), but there was no similar correlation for reducing cloacal virus titers (r s =À0.100, P = 0.78). This recombinant fowlpox-H5 avian in¯uenza hemagglutinin vaccine can provide protection against a variety of dierent highly pathogenic H5 avian in¯uenza viruses and frequent optimizing of the hemagglutinin insert to overcome genetic drift in the vaccine may not be necessary to provide adequate ®eld protection. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.

Vaccine protection of chickens against antigenically diverse H5 highly pathogenic avian influenza isolates with a live HVT vector vaccine expressing the influenza hemagglutinin gene derived from a clade 2.2 avian influenza virus

Vaccine, 2015

Vaccination is an important tool in the protection of poultry against avian influenza (AI). For field use, the overwhelming majority of AI vaccines produced are inactivated whole virus formulated into an oil emulsion. However, recombinant vectored vaccines are gaining use for their ability to induce protection against heterologous isolates and ability to overcome maternal antibody interference. In these studies, we compared protection of chickens provided by a turkey herpesvirus (HVT) vector vaccine expressing the hemagglutinin (HA) gene from a clade 2.2 H5N1 strain (A/swan/Hungary/4999/2006) against homologous H5N1 as well as heterologous H5N1 and H5N2 highly pathogenic (HP) AI challenge. The results demonstrated all vaccinated birds were protected from clinical signs of disease and mortality following homologous challenge. In addition, oral and cloacal swabs taken from challenged birds demonstrated that vaccinated birds had lower incidence and titers of viral shedding compared to ...

The hybrid cytomegalovirus enhancer/chicken beta-actin promoter along with woodchuck hepatitis virus posttranscriptional regulatory element enhances the protective efficacy of DNA vaccines

Journal of immunology (Baltimore, Md. : 1950), 2004

DNA vaccines represent a novel and powerful alternative to conventional vaccine approaches. They are extremely stable and can be produced en masse at low cost; more importantly, DNA vaccines against emerging pathogens or bioterrorism threats can be quickly constructed based solely upon the pathogen's genetic code. The main drawback of DNA vaccines is that they often induce lower immune responses than traditional vaccines, particularly in nonrodent species. Thus, improving the efficacy of DNA vaccines is a critical issue in vaccine development. In this study we have enhanced the efficacy of DNA vaccines by adopting strategies that increase gene expression. We generated influenza-hemagglutinin (HA)-encoding DNA vaccines that contain the hybrid CMV enhancer/chicken ␤-actin (CAG) promoter and/or the mRNA-stabilizing post-transcriptional regulatory element from the woodchuck hepatitis virus (WPRE). Mice were immunized with these DNA vaccines, and the influenza-HA-specific cellular and humoral immune responses were compared with a conventional, HA-encoding DNA vaccine whose gene expression was driven by the CMV immediate-early promoter (pCMV-HA). CAG promoter-driven DNA vaccines elicited significantly higher humoral and cellular immune responses compared with the pCMV-HA vaccine. DNA vaccines consisting of both CAG and WPRE elements (pCAG-HA-WPRE) induced the highest level of protective immunity, such that immunization with 10-fold lower DNA doses prevented death in 100% of the mice upon lethal viral challenge, whereas all mice immunized with the conventional pCMV-HA vaccine succumbed to influenza infection.

Comparison of Five Expression Vectors for the Ha Gene in Constructing a DNA Vaccine for H6N2 Influenza Virus in Chickens

Advances in Microbiology, 2016

A number of eukaryotic expression vectors have been developed for use as DNA vaccines. They showed varying abilities to initiate immune responses; however, there is little data to indicate which of these vectors will be the most useful and practical for DNA vaccines in different species. This report examines the use of five expression vectors with different promoters and Kozak sequence to express the same hemagglutinin (HA) protein of an H6N2 avian influenza virus for DNA vaccination in chickens. Although intramuscular vaccination with seven DNA constructs elicited no or limited measurable H6 HA antibody responses in Hy-Line chickens, variable reduction in virus shedding for either oropharyngeal or cloacal swabs post-virus challenge were observed. This indicated that all DNA constructs generated some levels of protective immunity against homologous virus challenge. Interestingly, lower dose (50 or 100 μg) of plasmid DNAs consistently induced better immune response than higher dose (300 or 500 μg). In the transfection experiments there appeared to be a hierarchy in the in vitro expression efficiency in the order of pCAG-optiHAk/ pCAG-HAk > pCI-HAk > VR-HA > pCI-HA > pCI-neo-HA > pVAX-HA. Since the level of in vitro expression correlates with the level of immune response in vivo, in vitro expression levels of the DNA constructs can be used as an indicator for pre-selection of plasmid vaccines prior to in vivo assessment. Moreover, our results suggested that the Kozak sequence could be used as an effective tool for DNA vaccine design.

Enhanced protection against a lethal influenza virus challenge by immunization with both hemagglutinin- and neuraminidase-expressing DNAs

Vaccine, 1999

The ability of plasmid DNA encoding hemagglutinin (HA), neuraminidase (NA) or matrix protein (M1) from in¯uenza virus A/PR/8/34 (PR8) (H1N1), and mixtures of these plasmid DNAs (HA + NA and HA + NA + M1) to protect against homologous or heterologous virus infection was examined in BALB/c mice. Each DNA was inoculated twice, 3 weeks apart, or four times, 2 weeks apart, at a dose of 1 mg of each component per mouse by particle-mediated DNA transfer to the epidermis (gene gun). Seven days after the last immunization, mice were challenged with a lethal homologous or heterologous virus and the ability of each DNA to protect the mice from in¯uenza was evaluated by observing lung virus titers and survival rates. The administration of a plasmid DNA mixture of either (HA + NA) or (HA + NA + M1) provided almost complete protection against the PR8 virus challenge, and this protection was accompanied by high levels of speci®c antibody responses to the respective components. The degree of protection aorded in these groups is signi®cantly higher than that in mice given either HA-or NA-expressing DNA alone, which provided only a partial protection against PR8 challenge or that in mice given M1expressing DNA, which failed to provide any protection. In addition, both of the plasmid DNA mixtures (HA + NA) and (HA + NA + M1) showed a slight tendency to provide cross-protection against an A/Yamagata/120/86 (H1N1) virus challenge, and this was accompanied by a relatively high level of cross-reacting antibodies. Thus, there was no clear dierence between the ability of the HA + NA and HA + NA + M1 plasmid DNA mixtures in providing protection against either a PR8 or heterologous virus challenge. These results suggest that in mice immunized by gene gun, a mixture of plasmid DNAs encoding HA and NA can provide the most eective protection against the virus challenge. The addition of the M1-expressing plasmid DNA to this mixture does not enhance the degree of protection aorded. #