Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 May 11;13(5):884.
doi: 10.3390/v13050884.

Harnessing Natural Mosaics: Antibody-Instructed, Multi-Envelope HIV-1 Vaccine Design

Robert E Sealy  1 , Barry Dayton  2 , David Finkelstein  3 , Julia L Hurwitz  1   4
Affiliations

Harnessing Natural Mosaics: Antibody-Instructed, Multi-Envelope HIV-1 Vaccine Design

Robert E Sealy et al. Viruses. .

Abstract

The year 2021 marks the 40th anniversary since physicians recognized symptoms of the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a disease that has since caused more than 30 million deaths worldwide. Despite the passing of four decades, there remains no licensed vaccine for the human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1), the etiologic agent of AIDS. Despite the development of outstanding anti-retroviral drugs, there are currently more than one-half million deaths each year due to AIDS. Here, we revisit a conventional vaccine strategy used for protection against variable pathogens like HIV-1, which combines an array of diverse surface antigens. The strategy uses antibody recognition patterns to categorize viruses and their surface antigens into groups. Then a leader is assigned for each group and group leaders are formulated into vaccine cocktails. The group leaders are 'natural mosaics', because they share one or more epitope(s) with each of the other group members. We encourage the application of this conventional approach to HIV-1 vaccine design. We suggest that the partnering of an antibody-instructed envelope cocktail with new vaccine vectors will yield a successful vaccine in the HIV-1 field.

Keywords: protective immunity; vaccines.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. Global HIV/AIDS Overview. [(accessed on 7 May 2021)]; Available online: https://www.hiv.gov/federal-response/pepfar-global-aids/global-hiv-aids-....
    1. Global HIV and AIDS statistics-2020 fact sheet. [(accessed on 28 February 2021)]; Available online: https://www.unaids.org/en/resources/fact-sheet.
    1. Jones L.D., Moody M.A., Thompson A.B. Innovations in HIV-1 Vaccine Design. Clin. Ther. 2020;42:499–514. doi: 10.1016/j.clinthera.2020.01.009. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Berman P.W., Gray A.M., Wrin T., Vennari J.C., Eastman D.J., Nakamura G.R., Francis N.P., Gorse G., Schwartz D.H. Genetic and Immunologic Characterization of Viruses Infecting MN-rgp120-Vaccinated Volunteers. J. Infect. Dis. 1997;176:384–397. doi: 10.1086/514055. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Adis Editorial HIV gp120 Vaccine—VaxGen: AIDSVAX™, AIDSVAX™ B/B, AIDSVAX™ B/E, HIV gp120 Vaccine—Genentech, HIV gp120 Vaccine AIDSVAX—VaxGen, HIV Vaccine AIDSVAX—VaxGen. Drugs R&D. 2003;4:249–253. doi: 10.2165/00126839-200304040-00007. - DOI - PubMed

Publication types