Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
6141653 | Virology | 2010 | 10 Pages |
Tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) is a severe disease affecting thousands of people throughout Eurasia. Despite the use of formalin-inactivated vaccines in endemic areas, an increasing incidence of TBE emphasizes the need for an alternative vaccine that will induce a more durable immunity against TBE virus (TBEV). The chimeric attenuated virus vaccine candidate containing the structural protein genes of TBEV on a dengue virus genetic background (TBEV/DEN4) retains a high level of neurovirulence in both mice and monkeys. Therefore, attenuating mutations were introduced into the envelope (E315) and NS5 (NS5654,655) proteins, and into the 3â² non-coding region (Î30) of TBEV/DEN4. The variant that contained all three mutations (vÎ30/E315/NS5654,655) was significantly attenuated for neuroinvasiveness and neurovirulence and displayed a reduced level of replication and virus-induced histopathology in the brains of mice. The high level of safety in the central nervous system indicates that vÎ30/E315/NS5654,655 should be further evaluated as a TBEV vaccine.