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Updated: Jul 12, 2025

Protocol for Recombinant RBD-based SARS Vaccines: Protein Preparation, Animal Vaccination and Neutralization Detection
Published on: May 2, 2011
Viral codon optimization on SARS-CoV-2 Spike boosts immunity in the development of COVID-19 mRNA vaccines
Chih-Jen Lai1,2, Dokyun Kim1,2, Seokmin Kang1,2
1Department of Cancer Biology and Infection Biology, Lerner Research Institute, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio, USA.
Abstract:
Life-long persistent herpesviruses carry "trans-inducers" to overcome the unusual codon usage of their glycoproteins for efficient expression. Strikingly, this "trans-inducibility" can be achieved by simply changing the codon-usage of acute virus glycoproteins to that of persistent herpesvirus glycoproteins with herpesviral trans-inducer. Here, we apply the "persistent viral codon-usage-trans-inducer" principle to SARS-CoV-2 Spike mRNA vaccine platform, in which the codon-usage of Spike is changed to that of Herpes Simplex Virus-1 (HSV-1) glycoprotein B (gB) with its "trans-inducer" ICP27. The HSVgB-ICP27-codon-optimized Spike mRNA vaccine induced markedly high antigen expression and stability, total IgG, neutralizing antibody, and T cell response, ultimately enhancing protection against lethal SARS-CoV-2 challenge. Moreover, the HSVgB- codon-optimized Delta (B.1.617.2) strain Spike mRNA vaccine provided significant enhancements in antigen expression and long-term protection against SARS-CoV-2 challenge. Thus, we report a novel persistent viral codon-usage-trans-inducer mRNA vaccine platform for enhanced antigen expression and long-term protection against lethal viral infection.
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