Prediction of Conserved HLA Class I and Class II Epitopes from SARS-CoV-2 Licensed Vaccines Supports T-Cell Cross-Protection against SARS-CoV-1

Heterologous immunity-inducing vaccines against different pathogens are necessary to deal with new pandemics. In this study, the possible impact of COVID-19 licensed formulations in the cytotoxic and the helper cellular immune responses against SARS-CoV-1 is analyzed for the 567 and 41 most abundant...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Daniel López
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2022-07-01
Series:Biomedicines
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9059/10/7/1622
Description
Summary:Heterologous immunity-inducing vaccines against different pathogens are necessary to deal with new pandemics. In this study, the possible impact of COVID-19 licensed formulations in the cytotoxic and the helper cellular immune responses against SARS-CoV-1 is analyzed for the 567 and 41 most abundant HLA class I and II alleles, respectively. Computational prediction showed that most of these 608 alleles, which cover >90% of the human population, contain enough conserved T-cell epitopes among SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2 spike proteins. In addition, the vast majority of these predicted peptides were defined as epitopes recognized by CD4<sup>+</sup> or CD8<sup>+</sup> T lymphocytes, showing a very high correlation between the bioinformatics prediction and the experimental assays. These data suggest that both cytotoxic and helper cellular immune protection elicited by the currently licensed COVID-19 vaccines should be effective against SARS-CoV-1 infection. Lastly, this study has potential implications for public health against current and future pandemics, given that the SARS-CoV-1 vaccines in pipeline since the early 20th century could generate similarly cross-protection against COVID-19.
ISSN:2227-9059