Nanoparticle- and Microparticle-Based Vaccines against Orbiviruses of Veterinary Importance

Abstract

Bluetongue virus (BTV) and African horse sickness virus (AHSV) are widespread arboviruses that cause important economic losses in the livestock and equine industries, respectively. In addition to these, another arthropod-transmitted orbivirus known as epizootic hemorrhagic disease virus (EHDV) entails a major threat as there is a conducive landscape that nurtures its emergence in non-endemic countries. To date, only vaccinations with live attenuated or inactivated vaccines permit the control of these three viral diseases, although important drawbacks, e.g., low safety profile and effectiveness, and lack of DIVA (differentiation of infected from vaccinated animals) properties, constrain their usage as prophylactic measures. Moreover, a substantial number of serotypes of BTV, AHSV and EHDV have been described, with poor induction of cross-protective immune responses among serotypes. In the context of next-generation vaccine development, antigen delivery systems based on nano- or microparticles have gathered significant attention during the last few decades. A diversity of technologies, such as virus-like particles or self-assembled protein complexes, have been implemented for vaccine design against these viruses. In this work, we offer a comprehensive review of the nano- and microparticulated vaccine candidates against these three relevant orbiviruses. Additionally, we also review an innovative technology for antigen delivery based on the avian reovirus nonstructural protein muNS and we explore the prospective functionality of the nonstructural protein NS1 nanotubules as a BTV-based delivery platform.

IFNAR(-/-) Mice Constitute a Suitable Animal Model for Epizootic Hemorrhagic Disease Virus Study and Vaccine Evaluation

“…IFNAR(-/-) mice are a useful and effective tool for efficacy studies of novel vaccines against BTV and AHSV (36,(82)(83)(84). Here, we confirmed the usefulness of the IFNAR(-/-) mouse model for the definition of effective vaccine candidates against EHDV.…”

Epizootic Hemorrhagic Disease Virus: Current Knowledge and Emerging Perspectives

“…In this sense, bi- or multivalent vaccines could be formulated as proposed in the study [ 164 ]. Different vaccine platforms widely used for novel BTV and AHSV vaccines [ 152 , 165 ] should be applied for generation of novel EHDV vaccines, e.g., subunit vaccine and viral vector-based vaccines. In this regard, Alshaikhahmed and Roy (2013) exploited their experience with non-infectious BTV-VLPs to develop core-like particles (CLPs, composed of VP3 and VP7) and virus-like particles (VLPs, composed of VP3, VP7, VP5 and VP2) of EHDV-2 [ 166 ] ( Table 3 ).…”

Cytokine mRNA Expression Profile in Target Organs of IFNAR (-/-) Mice Infected with African Horse Sickness Virus

“…Clinical signs appear in mice approximately 3-6 days after exposure to the virus [8,12]. This immunocompromised mouse model has been useful for the evaluation of prophylactic and therapeutic countermeasures as well as for pathology and immunobiology research [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23].…”