Incorporation of Heat-labile Enterotoxin B Subunit into Rabies Virus Particles Enhances Its Immunogenicity in Mice and Dogs

Overview

Journal Biosaf Health

Date 2025 Mar 13

PMID 40078911

Authors

Zhiyuan Gong

Hailun Li

Meichen Qian

Yujie Bai

Hongli Jin

Jingxuan Sun

Mengyao Zhang

Cuicui Jiao

Pei Huang

Yuanyuan Li

Haili Zhang

Hualei Wang

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Although inactivated vaccines against rabies have the advantage of high safety, effective protection against rabies virus (RABV) infection often requires multiple, high-dose immunization. Incorporating a molecular adjuvant into the viral particles has been found to be a useful strategy to promote the immune effectiveness of inactivated vaccines. In this study, we constructed a recombinant virus, rCVS11-LTB, which chimerically expresses a molecular adjuvant heat-labile enterotoxin B subunit (LTB) protein on the surface of the RABV particles. Immunogenicity was found to be promoted by rCVS11-LTB through the activation of dendritic cells (DCs). Our results demonstrated that inactivated rCVS11-LTB was able to induce higher levels of virus-neutralizing antibodies (VNAs) in both mice and dogs than the parent virus rCVS11, to enhance the cellular immune response and T cell immune memory in mice, and was also able to provide 100% protection in mice from lethal doses of rabies virus, indicating its potential as a safe and effective inactivated rabies vaccine candidate.

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