Q1 · BIOLOGY
Article
Author: Rothenberg, Daniel A. ; Poran, Asaf ; Liu-Lupo, Yunpeng ; Cadima Couto, Carla Iris ; Thanki, Kaushik ; Harjanto, Dewi ; Sahin, Ugur ; Meda, Shirisha ; Xie, Yushu Joy ; Fesser, Stephanie ; Vogel, Annette B. ; Tureci, Ozlem ; Walzer, Kerstin ; Arieta, Christina M. ; Lobo, Alexander ; Srouji, John R. ; Hein, Stephanie ; Marquart, Krisann ; Diao, Huitian ; Krumm, Stefanie A. ; Heinen, Andre P. ; Sciuto, Tracey E. ; Koenitzer, Byron ; Addona, Theresa A. ; Zuiani, Adam ; Ziegenhals, Thomas ; Gaynor, Richard B.
T cell responses play an important role in protection against beta-coronavirus infections, including SARS-CoV-2, where they associate with decreased COVID-19 disease severity and duration.To enhance T cell immunity across epitopes infrequently altered in SARS-CoV-2 variants, we designed BNT162b4, an mRNA vaccine component that is intended to be combined with BNT162b2, the spike-protein-encoding vaccine.BNT162b4 encodes variant-conserved, immunogenic segments of the SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid, membrane, and ORF1ab proteins, targeting diverse HLA alleles.BNT162b4 elicits polyfunctional CD4+ and CD8+ T cell responses to diverse epitopes in animal models, alone or when co-administered with BNT162b2 while preserving spike-specific immunity.Importantly, we demonstrate that BNT162b4 protects hamsters from severe disease and reduces viral titers following challenge with viral variants.These data suggest that a combination of BNT162b2 and BNT162b4 could reduce COVID-19 disease severity and duration caused by circulating or future variants.BNT162b4 is currently being clin. evaluated in combination with the BA.4/BA.5 Omicron-updated bivalent BNT162b2 (NCT05541861).