{"doi":"10.1101/2021.04.08.438884","title":"Polymersomes decorated with SARS-CoV-2 spike protein receptor binding domain elicit robust humoral and cellular immunity","abstract":"ABSTRACT A diverse portfolio of SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidates is needed to combat the evolving COVID-19 pandemic. Here, we developed a subunit nanovaccine by conjugating SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein receptor binding domain (RBD) to the surface of oxidation-sensitive polymersomes. We evaluated the humoral and cellular responses of mice immunized with these surface-decorated polymersomes (RBD surf ) compared to RBD-encapsulated polymersomes (RBD encap ) and unformulated RBD (RBD free ), using monophosphoryl lipid A-encapsulated polymersomes (MPLA PS) as an adjuvant. While all three groups produced high titers of RBD-specific IgG, only RBD surf elicited a neutralizing antibody response to SARS-CoV-2 comparable to that of human convalescent plasma. Moreover, RBD surf was the only group to significantly increase the proportion of RBD-specific germinal center B cells in the vaccination-site draining lymph nodes. Both RBD surf and RBD encap drove similarly robust CD4 + and CD8 + T cell responses that produced multiple Th1-type cytokines. We conclude that multivalent surface display of Spike RBD on polymersomes promotes a potent neutralizing antibody response to SARS-CoV-2, while both antigen formulations promote robust T cell immunity.","journal":"bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)","year":2021,"id":214169,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":11,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9584,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":687799,"name":"Rachel P. Wallace","orcid":"0000-0003-4439-1173","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":521999,"name":"Shijie Cao","orcid":"0000-0002-9175-0813","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687800,"name":"Michal M. Raczy","orcid":"0000-0001-8400-2051","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687801,"name":"Ruyi Wang","orcid":"0000-0001-5832-5391","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687802,"name":"Laura Gray","orcid":"0000-0002-5958-4405","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687803,"name":"Aaron T. Alpar","orcid":"0000-0003-4669-4813","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":650191,"name":"Priscilla S. Briquez","orcid":"0000-0002-4680-9636","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687804,"name":"Nikolaos Mitrousis","orcid":"0000-0002-6451-5180","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687805,"name":"Tiffany M. Marchell","orcid":"0000-0002-9913-9664","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687806,"name":"Maria Stella Sasso","orcid":"0000-0002-4625-9486","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":677229,"name":"Mindy Nguyen","orcid":"0000-0002-8749-3332","position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687807,"name":"Aslan Mansurov","orcid":"0000-0001-6574-9053","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687808,"name":"Erica Budina","orcid":"0000-0001-8510-0497","position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687809,"name":"Ani Solanki","orcid":"0000-0002-7190-7852","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687810,"name":"Elyse A. Watkins","orcid":"0000-0003-2691-5930","position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687811,"name":"Mathew R. Schnorenberg","orcid":"0000-0002-2876-573X","position":16,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687812,"name":"Andrew C. Tremain","orcid":"0000-0003-2314-8211","position":17,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687813,"name":"Joseph W. 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LaBelle","orcid":"0000-0001-6776-4695","position":24,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":680560,"name":"Matthew Tirrell","orcid":"0000-0001-6185-119X","position":25,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":536228,"name":"Glenn Randall","orcid":"0000-0001-7417-3615","position":26,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":688582,"name":"Marcin Kwissa","orcid":null,"position":27,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":307323,"name":"Melody A. Swartz","orcid":"0000-0001-5484-1903","position":28,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":650193,"name":"Jeffrey A. Hubbell","orcid":"0000-0003-0276-5456","position":29,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":687798,"name":"Lisa R. Volpatti","orcid":"0000-0001-6197-0703","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":67,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:52:41.672172Z","pmid":"33851166","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}