Chimeric vaccine design against the epidemic Langya Henipavirus using immunoinformatics and validation via immune simulation approaches
Aamir Fahira,
Rana Sherdil Amin,
Uzma Arshad,
Muhammad Idrees Khan,
Ali Alamdar Shah Syed,
Abdulrahman Alshammari,
Qiangzhen Yang,
Zhuo Wang,
Liaqat Ali,
Yongyong Shi
Affiliations
Aamir Fahira
Bio-X Institutes, Key Laboratory for the Genetics of Developmental and Neuropsychiatric Disorders (Ministry of Education), Collaborative Innovation Centre for Brain Science, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China; The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, The Biomedical Sciences Institute of Qingdao University (Qingdao Branch of SJTU Bio-X Institutes), Qingdao University, Qingdao, Shandong Province, China
Rana Sherdil Amin
Sharif Medical and Dental College, Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan
Uzma Arshad
Gujranwala Medical College, Gujranwala, Punjab, Pakistan
Muhammad Idrees Khan
School of Sensing Science and Engineering, School of Electronic Information and Electrical Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China
Ali Alamdar Shah Syed
Bio-X Institutes, Key Laboratory for the Genetics of Developmental and Neuropsychiatric Disorders (Ministry of Education), Collaborative Innovation Centre for Brain Science, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China
Abdulrahman Alshammari
Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, College of Pharmacy, King Saud University, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
Qiangzhen Yang
Bio-X Institutes, Key Laboratory for the Genetics of Developmental and Neuropsychiatric Disorders (Ministry of Education), Collaborative Innovation Centre for Brain Science, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China
Zhuo Wang
Bio-X Institutes, Key Laboratory for the Genetics of Developmental and Neuropsychiatric Disorders (Ministry of Education), Collaborative Innovation Centre for Brain Science, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China; The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, The Biomedical Sciences Institute of Qingdao University (Qingdao Branch of SJTU Bio-X Institutes), Qingdao University, Qingdao, Shandong Province, China
Liaqat Ali
Fisch College of Pharmacy, The University of Texas at Tyler, Tyler, TX, USA
Yongyong Shi
Bio-X Institutes, Key Laboratory for the Genetics of Developmental and Neuropsychiatric Disorders (Ministry of Education), Collaborative Innovation Centre for Brain Science, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China; The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, The Biomedical Sciences Institute of Qingdao University (Qingdao Branch of SJTU Bio-X Institutes), Qingdao University, Qingdao, Shandong Province, China; Corresponding author. Bio-X Institutes, Key Laboratory for the Genetics of Developmental and Neuropsychiatric Disorders (Ministry of Education), Collaborative Innovation Centre for Brain Science, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.
In July 2022, a new virus called Langya virus (LayV) was discovered in China in patients who had a fever. This virus is a type of Henipavirus (HNV) and is considered a potential threat as it could spread from animals to humans. It causes respiratory disease with symptoms including fever, coughing, and fatigue and is closely linked to two other henipaviruses that are known to infect humans, namely Hendra and Nipah viruses. These viruses may cause fatal respiratory illnesses. Investigators believe that the LayV is spread by shrews, and may have infected humans directly or via an intermediary species. Thus, the use of vaccines or immunizations against LayV is an alternate strategy for disease prevention. In this study, we employed various immunoinformatics methods to predict B cell, HTL and T cell epitopes from the LayV proteome in order to find the most promising candidate for a LayV vaccine. The most potent epitopes that are immunogenic and non-allergenic were joined with each other through suitable linkers. Human β-defensin 2 was employed as an adjuvant to increase the immunogenicity of the vaccine construct. The final sequence of a multi-epitope vaccine construct was modelled for docking with TLRs. Concisely, our results suggest that the docked complexes of vaccine-TLRs seemed to be stable. Additionally, in silico cloning was done using E. coli as the host in order to validate the expression of our designed vaccine construct. The GC content of 54.39% and CAI value of 0.94 revealed that the vaccine component expresses efficiently in the host. This study presents the novel vaccine construct for LayV which will be essential for further experimental validations to confirm the immunogenicity and safety of the proposed vaccine structure, and eventually to treat HNV-related diseases.
