Potential of chimaeric plant virus particles as novel, stable vaccines

Technology has been developed for the expression of multiple copies of epitopes from human and animal pathogens on the surface of assembled particles of a plant virus (cowpea mosaic virus). The technology, termed the Chimaeric Virus Particle (CVP) Technology, can be exploited for the production of vaccines in plants. Each chimaeric virus particle contains 60 copies of the foreign peptide which are expressed in highly exposed positions on the surface of the virus particle. Viral and bacterial epitopes have been expressed as CVPs in an immunologically active form. CPMV is stable at temperatures up to 65 degrees C and a chimaera expressing an HIV epitope survives exposure to a protease and to pH values as low as 1.0.