Scientists in India have claimed to have designed a vaccine, or rather a universal vaccine that can be used effectively against all the coronavirus variants that have been triggered by the once in a century pandemic that hit the globe a couple of years back.
We have all seen new variants cause fresh waves of infection. However, in what can be assumed as the turning point, scientists from the Kazi Nazrul University in Asansol and the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research in Bhubaneswar have come up with a peptide vaccine which, according to them, can act as a shield of protection against any future variants of the coronavirus. Their research has now been accepted for publication in the journal of molecular liquids, which completely dedicates itself to elements of structure, dynamic processes, and interactions in simple, complex, or even molecular fluids.
According to the researchers, in this study, they employed the immunoinformatic approach in order to design AbhiSCovac, which happens to be a multi-epitome and multi-chimeric peptide that will be equipped to generate immunity that will be protective against all the six virulent members, which includes SARS-CoV-2 as well. According to the researchers from the above institutes of national repute, the newly designed vaccine has been regarded as very stable, immunogenic, and antigenic.
As per Abhigyan Choudhary from Kazi Nazrul University, the researchers have constituted the vaccine with the use of computational methods, and the next step is going to be the vaccine production, which will then be followed by testing. Choudhary adds that this vaccine is surely one of a kind since no other jab the world over has been developed to cope with the entire Coronaviridae family, all at once. According to Choudhary, the researchers first identified numerous conserved regions in the spike protein across all six viruses that have few mutations and thus change slightly in the pandemic course. Also, these protein regions are highly immunogenic, which throws light on the fact that they can develop high levels of immune memory within the body, which is prime in fighting against the virus.
As opposed to other vaccines, the ones that have been currently identified have shown exceptional binding strengths with TLR4, a protein that is responsible for detecting SARS-CoV-2 in the body and starting the immune response. Choudhary concludes that the team has also stimulated infection in virtual patients and has inferred that the vaccine is very much capable of protecting its recipient from the virus.
