{"id":29314,"date":"2016-07-22T16:54:23","date_gmt":"2016-07-22T20:54:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sciencebusiness.technewslit.com\/?p=29314"},"modified":"2016-07-22T16:54:23","modified_gmt":"2016-07-22T20:54:23","slug":"common-antibodies-found-for-multi-virus-flu-vaccine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/technewslit.com\/sciencebusiness\/?p=29314","title":{"rendered":"Common Antibodies Found for Multi-Virus Flu Vaccine"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Vaccination\"<\/a>
(U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

22 July 2016. A team at National Institutes of Health<\/a> discovered three types of antibodies that can neutralize a variety of influenza viral strains infecting humans. Researchers from National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and National Human Genome Research Institute published their findings yesterday in the journal Cell<\/em><\/a> (paid subscription required).<\/p>\n

The team led by Peter Kwong, John Mascola, and Adrian McDermott at NIAID are seeking a more robust strategy for flu vaccine design, which today requires creating a new vaccine formula every year to meet anticipated mutations in flu viruses. Because vaccines need a long lead time to develop a new formulation, manufacture sufficient quantities, and ship inventories were needed, health authorities often must guess well in advance at the precise targets for each year’s flu vaccine.<\/p>\n

Most seasonal flu vaccines<\/a> in the U.S. cover 3 or 4 strains or lines of the virus. In recent years those strains include H1N1 and H3N2 among the influenza A viruses, and 1 or 2 influenza B lines. Influenza A viruses have 11 different strains<\/a>, while influenza B viruses have 2 main varieties. People older than 65 usually get a higher dose of the vaccine since between 80 and 90 percent of flu related deaths have occurred in people 65 years and older.<\/p>\n

In the paper, the researchers took blood samples from 6 participants in a clinical trial testing a vaccine protecting against the H5N1<\/a> or avian flu virus, a strain of influenza A. From the samples, the team identified white blood cells, called B cells, in the immune system producing antibodies that reacted to the test vaccine. The researchers then genetically analyzed the antibodies from these reacting B cells.<\/p>\n

Results of the analysis reveal 3 classes of antibodies capable of addressing a wide range of influenza A sub-types, from a common characteristic in their hemagglutinin<\/a> proteins — the “H” in the influenza strain code. The stem in the crystalline protein structure of the hemagglutinin stem had a common binding area for antibodies. Thus various strains of influenza A viruses may have different protein structures, but the binding regions in the stems overlapped.<\/p>\n

The researchers point out that a common binding region in the flu virus stem was found before, but only in humans developing antibodies resulting from a natural flu virus infection. These new findings indicate a common binding region covering a wide range of influenza strains could be induced with a vaccine.<\/p>\n

As a result, the authors recommend using the sequencing data from these B cells as a benchmark for measuring the breadth of immune responses in future vaccine trials.<\/p>\n

Read more:<\/p>\n