iScience
Volume 26, Issue 4, 21 April 2023, 106292
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Article
Monovalent and trivalent VSV-based COVID-19 vaccines elicit neutralizing antibodies and CD8+ T cells against SARS-CoV-2 variants

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2023.106292Get rights and content
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open access

Highlights

  • Produced replication-competent rVSV-based vaccines with variant SARS-CoV-2 spikes

  • Variant vaccines elicited potent nAbs against diverse SARS-CoV-2 strains

  • Delta booster and Trivalent vaccines were superior to the original Wuhan spike vaccine

  • All vaccines elicited a spike-specific immunodominant CD8+ T cell response

Summary

Recombinant vesicular stomatitis virus (rVSV) vaccines expressing spike proteins of Wuhan, Beta, and/or Delta variants of SARS-CoV-2 were generated and tested for induction of antibody and T cell immune responses following intramuscular delivery to mice. rVSV-Wuhan and rVSV-Delta vaccines and an rVSV-Trivalent (mixed rVSV-Wuhan, -Beta, -Delta) vaccine elicited potent neutralizing antibodies (nAbs) against live SARS-CoV-2 Wuhan (USAWA1), Beta (B.1.351), Delta (B.1.617.2), and Omicron (B.1.1.529) viruses. Prime-boost vaccination with rVSV-Beta was less effective in this capacity. Heterologous boosting of rVSV-Wuhan with rVSV-Delta induced strong nAb responses against Delta and Omicron viruses, with the rVSV-Trivalent vaccine consistently effective in inducing nAbs against all the SARS-CoV-2 variants tested. All vaccines, including rVSV-Beta, elicited a spike-specific immunodominant CD8+ T cell response. Collectively, rVSV vaccines targeting SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern may be considered in the global fight against COVID-19.

Subject areas

Immunology
Virology

Data and code availability

  • All data reported in this paper will be shared by the lead contact upon request.

  • This paper does not report original code.

  • Any additional information required to reanalyze the data reported in this paper is available from the lead contact upon request.

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