[Elucidation of virus-host interaction using animal models towards vaccine development]

Area of Science:

• Immunology
• Vaccinology
• Virology

Background:

• Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) establishes lifelong infections due to complex virus-host immune interactions.
• Effective vaccine strategies are needed to control the global HIV epidemic, but optimal immunization methods remain elusive.

Purpose of the Study:

• To analyze in vivo virus-host immune interactions using animal models.
• To develop novel vaccine immunogens and strategies for inducing protective immune responses against viral infections.
• To apply findings from HIV research to other viral diseases like HTLV and COVID-19.

Main Methods:

• Development of a novel immunogen designed to elicit specific CD8+ T-cell responses.
• Evaluation of vaccine efficacy against simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) challenge in macaque models.
• Analysis of germline immunoglobulin gene polymorphism and its impact on neutralizing antibody induction against SIV.
• Testing vaccine-induced immune responses against Human T-lymphotropic Virus (HTLV) and SARS-CoV-2 in macaques.

Main Results:

• A novel immunogen successfully induced virus-specific CD8+ T-cell responses and demonstrated protective efficacy against SIV challenge.
• Identified associations between macaque germline immunoglobulin genes and the induction of specific anti-SIV neutralizing antibodies.
• Vaccine-induced neutralizing antibodies showed protective efficacy against HTLV infection.
• Vaccine-induced CD8+ T-cell responses led to viral suppression of SARS-CoV-2 in macaque models.

Conclusions:

• Novel immunogens can effectively induce protective CD8+ T-cell and antibody responses against persistent viruses.
• Understanding host genetic factors, like immunoglobulin gene polymorphism, is key to optimizing vaccine-induced antibody responses.
• The developed strategies show promise for controlling HIV, HTLV, and SARS-CoV-2 infections.