Viral Immunogens and Vaccines

Dear Colleagues,

The prevention of infectious diseases by vaccination is one of the most important achievements in medicine, perhaps best exemplified by the successful eradication of smallpox in 1978 and the near eradication of polio. A great proportion of common vaccines used today targets viral infections, such as hepatitis A, hepatitis B, human papillomaviruses (HPV), influenza, measles, mumps, rubella, polio, rabies, rotavirus, varicella and shingles, tick borne encephalitis, Japanese encephalitis, and yellow fever. New vaccines against emerging and re-emerging viral threats are continuously developed, with examples of powerful vaccines against Ebola, West Nile, Zika, MERS, and human hepatitis E viruses. Since the announcement of this issue, a new devastating health hazard has emerged: the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, which has already affected over 7 million people and caused over 400,000 deaths worldwide. Extensive efforts are made to develop a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine, with clinical trial stage reached with unprecedented speed. It is important to maintain the peer-review process to scrutinize new data, to ensure high quality of the research data and secure vaccine development from taking any short-cuts. At this critical stage of vaccine development, we heartily invite submissions on all topics related to immunogenicity of SARS-CoV antigens and vaccine development from preclinical tests to clinical trials.

In corona-virus times we risk to undervalue the numbers of infected and death toll due to the chronic viral infections of the “old”/pre-pandemics world, which greatly exceed the numbers for SARS-CoV-2. We have now nearly 38 million people leaving with HIV-1, and 770,000 people died of HIV-1 only in 2018. In the 35-year history of the HIV epidemic, only four HIV vaccine concepts have been tested for clinical efficacy in a total of six trials. Of these, only one, the RV144 study, demonstrated positive results, providing 31% short-term efficacy in a low-risk population in Thailand. The results of this study, published 10 years ago, have not been repeated by any other studies. The main challenges facing the development of an HIV vaccine — unprecedented in the history of vaccinology — namely, the need to protect against globally diverse virus strains and unclear immune correlates of protection, demand further collaborative efforts.

For human hepatitis C (HCV), situation is not better. Globally, there are over 70 million infected, about 400,000 die yearly due to chronic HCV infection, cirrhosis and HCV-related cancer. HCV infection is often asymptomatic, and is missed until severe liver disease develops. The success of directly acting antiviral drugs (DAA) questioned the need for an HCV vaccine. However, as of today, DAAs are still unavailable to many people because of high price, they do not protect against reinfection and do not cure HCV-induced liver cirrhosis and cancer. The knowledge of immune correlates of protection, together with the demonstrated efficacies of a number of HCV vaccine candidates in animals, give hope for a prophylactic HCV vaccine that would aid in meeting the World Health Organization’s target of eliminating HCV by 2030, but much remains to be done to reach this goal.

Chronic viral infections cause up to 10% of cancers worldwide. Vaccines against viruses causing chronic infections, such as HBV or HPV, became the first successful anticancer vaccines. Despite massive vaccination efforts (especially for HBV), none of these viruses has been eliminated (as smallpox) or is even close to being eliminated. Many millions are chronically infected and are, today, at risk of developing cancer. This shapes a specific area of research aimed to develop viral immunogens to serve for therapeutic vaccination against cancer associated with hepatitis B, herpes, and papilloma virus infections. Last but not least, many viral infections today are effectively treated with antiviral drugs. However, application of antivirals may trigger drug resistance, as has been emerging in both acute (influenza) and chronic viral infections (HIV-1, HBV, HCV, HSV, etc.). The role of drug escape mutations in viral evolution, as well as their implications for the development of viral vaccines, are unclear. Escape mutations have also been registered in viral vaccine applications, as in the case of HBV. The generation of viral escape variants, resistant to treatment and/or vaccination, points at the need to develop specific vaccines against drug/vaccine resistant strains and vaccines to prevent the development of resistance.

The aim of this Special issue is to present the latest updates in the multidisciplinary research on established and new viral vaccines, such as ones developed against SARS-CoV-2.

As the Guest Editors of this Special Issue, we invite you to submit research articles, review articles, and short communications related to the immunogenicity of viral proteins, mechanisms of antiviral immunity, structure-based rational immunogen design, novel viral vaccine modalities and formulations, preclinical and clinical testing of viral vaccines. Contributions that elucidate protective immune response to acute, chronic, or latent viral infections, and differences in protective responses to different types of infections are heartily welcomed. Your contribution to this Special Issue will boost the advancement of the field of viral vaccine development and ultimately lead to the design and preclinical and clinical application of novel viral immunogens that prevent or treat acute and chronic viral infections.

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Maria G. Isaguliants
Dr. Karl Ljungberg
Prof. Dr. Karen Kyuregyan
Dr. Juris Jansons
Guest Editors

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