Ebolavirus Vaccine Development

Ebolavirus Vaccine Development

Ebolavirus disease (EVD) caused by Ebolavirus (EBOV), also known as Ebola hemorrhagic fever, is an acute, severe and often fatal disease with an average mortality rate of about 50%, ranging from 25% to 90%. EVD transmission is primarily due to contact with the blood or body fluids of infected humans or animals and is a challenge to human health.

Overview of Ebolavirus

The genus Ebolavirus in the Filoviridae family includes five species: Bundibugyo ebolavirus, Sudan ebolavirus, Tai Forest ebolavirus, Reston ebolavirus, and Zaire ebolavirus. Among them, the Zaire ebolavirus, commonly known as EBOV, is one of the most dangerous microorganisms in the world. EBOV can efficiently infect a variety of cell types, such as monocytes, macrophages, dendritic cells, endothelial cells, fibroblasts, hepatocytes, and adrenal cortical cells. After host cell attachment, the virus is internalized by macrocytic phagocytosis. EBOV can cause an outbreak of EVD in humans with an incubation period of 2 to 21 days, starting with nonspecific symptoms (including fever, fatigue, and muscle pain) and progressing to vomiting, diarrhea, bleeding, coma, and mental disorder.

Schematic representation of EBOV entry. (Salata C, et al., 2019)

Ebolavirus Genome

EBOV is an enveloped, negative-strand RNA virus with a virion diameter of approximately 80 nm. The genome is approximately 19 kb in size and encodes seven structural proteins: the nucleoprotein (N), the virion protein (VP) 24, VP35, VP30, VP40, the glycoprotein (GP), and RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (L). Among them, VP40, GP and NP are the three most abundant structural proteins in the EBOV genome, and the content of each protein in the capsid is about 37.7%, 4.7% and 17%, respectively. As the most abundant structural protein of EBOV, VP40 promotes viral capsid assembly by interacting with host proteins. GP can determine viral tropism, viral attachment, and entry by interacting with EBOV target cells. In addition, GP has important implications for the study of potential vaccines for EBOV. In native viruses, NP form the viral nucleocapsid that protects the genomic RNA.

Ebola virus structure. (Baseler L, et al., 2017)

Ebolavirus Candidates Vaccine

As an EBO that threatens human public health, to date, the only available treatments are medical support or emergency use of experimental drugs, and there are currently no licensed vaccines. Many vaccine candidates for EBO are vector-based, such as vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV), rabies virus (RABV), adenovirus (Ad), and cytomegalovirus (CMV), among others. Other platform vaccines include virus-like particle (VLP), DNA and subunit vaccines. Vaccines based on VLPs are promising vaccines.

How We Can Help

As an expert in building VLPs from VLPlant^TM platform, CD BioSciences uses its expertise to help our clients develop Ebolavirus vaccines. We are good at customizing our services according to the needs of our clients. Please contact us if you are interested.

Our capabilities include but are not limited to:

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References

1. Salata C.; et al., Ebola Virus Entry: From Molecular Characterization to Drug Discovery. Viruses. 2019, 11:1-20.
2. Baseler L.; et al., The Pathogenesis of Ebola Virus Disease. Annu Rev Pathol. 2017, 12:387-418.