Immunogenicity and protective efficacy of a recombinant protein subunit vaccine and an inactivated vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 variants in non-human primates

作者：Qian He, Qunying Mao, Xiaozhong Peng, Zhanlong He, Shuaiyao Lu, Jialu Zhang, Fan Gao, Lianlian Bian, Chaoqiang An, Wenhai Yu, Fengmei Yang, Yanan Zhou, Yun Yang, Yanyan Li, Yadi Yuan, Xujia Yan, Jinghuan Yang, Xing Wu, Weijin Huang, Changgui Li, Junzhi Wang, Zhenglun Liang, Miao Xu · 发表于：Signal Transduction and Targeted Therapy · 年份：2022 · DOI：10.1038/s41392-022-00926-y · 被引用次数：30 · 研究领域：SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 Research、COVID-19 Clinical Research Studies、Animal Virus Infections Studies

Emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants and the gradually decreasing neutralizing antibodies over time post vaccination have led to an increase in incidents of breakthrough infection across the world. To investigate the potential protective effect of the recombinant protein subunit COVID-19 vaccine targeting receptor-binding domain (RBD) (PS-RBD) and whole inactivated virus particle vaccine (IV) against the variant strains, in this study, rhesus macaques were immunized with PS-RBD or IV vaccine, followed by a Beta variant (B.1.351) challenge. Although neutralizing activity against the Beta variant was reduced compared with that against the prototype, the decreased viral load in both upper and lower respiratory tracts, milder pathological changes, and downregulated inflammatory cytokine levels in lung tissues after challenge demonstrated that PS-RBD and IV still provided effective protection against the Beta variant in the macaque model. Furthermore, PS-RBD-induced macaque sera possessed general binding and neutralizing activity to Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Omicron variants in our study, though the neutralizing antibody (NAb) titers declined by varying degrees, demonstrating potential protection of PS-RBD against current circulating variants of concern (VOCs). Interestingly, although the IV vaccine-induced extremely low neutralizing antibody titers against the Beta variant, it still showed reduction for viral load and significantly alleviated pathological change. Other correlates of vaccin...