Heterologous prime-boost: breaking the protective immune response bottleneck of COVID-19 vaccine candidates

作者：Qian He, Qunying Mao, Chaoqiang An, Jialu Zhang, Fan Gao, Lianlian Bian, Changgui Li, Zhenglun Liang, Miao Xu, Junzhi Wang · 发表于：Emerging Microbes & Infections · 年份：2021 · DOI：10.1080/22221751.2021.1902245 · 被引用次数：169 · 研究领域：SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 Research、COVID-19 Clinical Research Studies、Immunotherapy and Immune Responses

COVID-19 vaccines emerging from different platforms differ in efficacy, duration of protection, and side effects. To maximize the benefits of vaccination, we explored the utility of employing a heterologous prime-boost strategy in which different combinations of the four types of leading COVID-19 vaccine candidates that are undergoing clinical trials in China were tested in a mouse model. Our results showed that sequential immunization with adenovirus vectored vaccine followed by inactivated/recombinant subunit/mRNA vaccine administration specifically increased levels of neutralizing antibodies and promoted the modulation of antibody responses to predominantly neutralizing antibodies. Moreover, a heterologous prime-boost regimen with an adenovirus vector vaccine also improved Th1-biased T cell responses. Our results provide new ideas for the development and application of COVID-19 vaccines to control the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic.