Crick researchers report positive findings from tests on mice
UK-based researchers believe they have made progress towards developing a universal coronavirus vaccine, which they hope will one day solve the problems caused by Covid variants that are less sensitive to existing vaccinations.
Researchers at the Francis Crick Institute in London have found that a specific area of the Sars-Cov-2 spike protein, which they are labelling S2 as opposed to the S1 area used for the first vaccines, is a promising target for a pan-coronavirus vaccine.
They believe that a vaccine based on the discovery could offer some protection against new virus variants and common colds caused by coronaviruses, as well as helping prepare for future pandemics.
The researchers found that mice vaccinated in this way created antibodies that were able to neutralise a number of other animal and human coronaviruses—including the alpha, beta and delta variants, the original omicron and two bat coronaviruses.
More robust
Kevin Ng, a first author of the paper and a PhD student in the retrovirus laboratory at the Crick, said the research had identified a “promising target for a potential pan-coronavirus vaccine, because this area is much more similar across different coronaviruses than the S1 area. It is less subject to mutations, and so a vaccine targeted at this area should be more robust.”
George Kassiotis, corresponding author and principal group leader at the Crick, said: “The expectation for a vaccine that targets the S2 area is that it could offer some protection against all current, as well as future, coronaviruses.”
He added that there was “a lot of research still to do” as testing continued.
Penny Ward, an independent pharmaceutical physician and visiting professor in pharmaceutical medicine at King’s College London, said a universal coronavirus vaccine “could solve the problem of endless new waves of disease caused by variants with reduced vaccine sensitivity”.