{"doi":"10.1101/2021.08.05.455241","title":"A Herpes Simplex Virus Type-1-derived influenza vaccine induces balanced adaptive immune responses and protects mice from lethal influenza virus challenge","abstract":"Abstract Influenza virus is a major respiratory viral pathogen responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands worldwide each year. Current vaccines provide protection primarily by inducing strain-specific antibody responses with the requirement of a match between vaccine strains and circulating strains. It has been suggested that anti-influenza T-cell responses, in addition to antibody responses may provide the broadest protection against different flu strains. Therefore, to address this urgent need, it is desirable to develop a vaccine candidate with an ability to induce balanced adaptive immunity including cell mediated immune responses. A live viral vector technology should exhibit safety, immunogenicity, effectiveness in the presence of pre-existing immunity, and the ability to induce mucosal immune responses. Here, we used VC2, an established Herpes Simplex Virus type 1 vaccine vector, to express the influenza HA protein. We show that this virus is capable of generating potent and specific anti-influenza humoral and cell-mediated immune responses. We further show that a single vaccination with the VC2-derived influenza vaccine protects mice from lethal challenge with influenza virus. Our data support the continued development of VC2-derived influenza vaccines for protection of human populations from both seasonal and pandemic strains of influenza. Finally, our results support the potential of VC2-derived vaccines as a platform for the rapid development of vaccines against emerging and established pathogens, particularly respiratory pathogens.","journal":"bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)","year":2021,"id":221384,"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":1,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9619,"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":821408,"name":"Harrison Dulin","orcid":"0000-0001-8283-0291","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":507026,"name":"Ifeanyi K. Uche","orcid":"0000-0003-3479-5705","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":340997,"name":"Michael C. McGee","orcid":null,"position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":821967,"name":"Blake Breitenstein","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":793172,"name":"Gene S. Tan","orcid":"0000-0002-8965-1509","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":302237,"name":"Weishan Huang","orcid":"0000-0002-1330-1131","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":507028,"name":"Konstantin G. Kousoulas","orcid":"0000-0001-7077-9003","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305642,"name":"Rong Hai","orcid":"0000-0002-0577-4676","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":507029,"name":"Paul J. F. Rider","orcid":"0000-0002-5702-0809","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":50,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:53:55.215284Z","pmid":null,"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":[]}