Immunogenicity and structures of a rationally designed prefusion MERS-CoV spike antigen

Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) is a lineage C betacoronavirus that since its emergence in 2012 has caused outbreaks in human populations with case-fatality rates of ∼36%. As in other coronaviruses, the spike (S) glycoprotein of MERS-CoV mediates receptor recognition and membrane fusion and is the primary target of the humoral immune response during infection. Here we use structure-based design to develop a generalizable strategy for retaining coronavirus S proteins in the antigenically optimal prefusion conformation and demonstrate that our engineered immunogen is able to elicit high neutralizing antibody titers against MERS-CoV. We also determined high-resolution structures of the…

• DO
  Division of Intramural Research, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases

  Award: AI005125
• VR
  Vaccine Research Center
• NI
  National Institute of General Medical Sciences

  Award: P20GM113132
• NI
  National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases

  Award: R01AI127521
• AN
  Argonne National Laboratory
• SN
  SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory