Approaches to the construction of new candidate poliovirus type 3 vaccine strains

The World Health Organization has called for improvements to oral polio vaccines (OPV), particularly the type 3 component. Our improved understanding of the genetic basis of attenuation and antigenicity of this strain gives rise to possibilities for constructing new derivatives via mutagenesis of infectious cDNA. This article reviews progress made with various approaches to constructing a new type 3 candidate vaccine strain. These include the construction of antigen chimaeras of poliovirus based on the Sabin type 1 strain, the introduction of new genetically stable attenuation mutations into the 5' non-coding region (NCR) of the type 3 poliovirus genome, and the introduction of mutations which may increase the thermostability of the type 3 vaccine.