abstract

• The emergence of new pathogenic viral strains is a constant threat to global health, with the new coronavirus strain COVID-19 as the latest example. COVID-19, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus has quickly spread around the globe. This pandemic demands rapid development of drugs and vaccines. Plant-based vaccines are a technology with proven viability, which have led to promising results for candidates evaluated at the clinical level, meaning this technology could contribute towards the fight against COVID-19. Herein, a perspective in how plant-based vaccines can be developed against COVID-19 is presented. Injectable vaccines could be generated by using transient expression systems, which offer the highest protein yields and are already adopted at the industrial level to produce VLPs-vaccines and other biopharmaceuticals under GMPC-processes. Stably-transformed plants are another option, but this approach requires more time for the development of antigen-producing lines. Nonetheless, this approach offers the possibility of developing oral vaccines in which the plant cell could act as the antigen delivery agent. Therefore, this is the most attractive approach in terms of cost, easy delivery, and mucosal immunity induction. The development of multiepitope, rationally-designed vaccines is also discussed regarding the experience gained in expression of chimeric immunogenic proteins in plant systems. © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.

authors

• Arevalo-Villalobos J.I.
• González Ortega Omar
• Márquez-Escobar V.A.
• Nieto-Gómez R.
• Rosales Mendoza Sergio

publication date

• 2020-01-01

funding provided via

• PRODEP-2020  Grant
• Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí, UASLP: FAI-2020  Grant

published in

• Vaccines  Journal

keywords

• Epitope-based vaccine; Molecular farming; Mucosal immunization; Multiepitope vaccine; Oral vaccines; Zoonosis adjuvant; aluminum hydroxide; bacterial toxin; elastin; epitope; gamma interferon; glycoprotein; hepatitis B surface antigen; immunoglobulin A; immunoglobulin G1; influenza vaccine; interleukin 10; interleukin 2; interleukin 4; live vaccine; monoclonal antibody; n acetylglucosamine; nucleocapsid protein; plant medicinal product; poliomyelitis vaccine; recombinant vaccine; toll like receptor; tumor necrosis factor; virus envelope protein; virus RNA; virus vaccine; adaptive immunity; affinity chromatography; Agrobacterium; CD4+ T lymphocyte; CD8+ T lymphocyte; clinical trial (topic); coronavirus disease 2019; electron microscopy; glycosylation; Hepatitis B virus; human; Human immunodeficiency virus; medical technology; Middle East respiratory syndrome; Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus; Mycobacterium tuberculosis; Nicotiana benthamiana; nonhuman; poliomyelitis; Review; SARS coronavirus; Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2; Th1 cell; vaccination; vaccine immunogenicity; virus neutralization; virus replication

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

• 10.3390/vaccines8020183

start page

end page

volume

• 8

issue

• 2