Platform Technology Applications in Veterinary Vaccine Development and its Advantages for Public Health

March 20, 2023

Abstract

For the past 200 years, the animal-human interface has been a key factor in the development of vaccination. The pathogen of interest was grown, attenuated, inactivated, and fractionated to create many conventional veterinary vaccinations. Although these strategies have been quite effective, we have come to the point where they have mostly been used up and new strategies are needed. The functionality of subunit vaccines has also, until very recently, been largely restricted to diseases that can be controlled by humoral immunity, despite the fact that they have improved safety profiles and created opportunities for combined discrimination between vaccinated and infected animal (DIVA) approaches.

Introduction

The field of vaccineology has its roots in a sequence of empirical findings and technological advancements that have gradually altered how vaccines are created and administered in order to prevent and treat disease. From Edward Jenner's use of cowpox as a vaccine for human smallpox to the development of Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) from cattle tubercule bacilli as a vaccine for human tuberculosis to the development of novel vaccine vectors through genetic modification of animal and human pathogens, the animal-human interface has been a fundamental component of advancements in vaccination. Based on technological advancements, the history of vaccination has been roughly divided into two phases. The first of them, known as the empirical era, was characterized by trial-and-error methods that relied on the capacity to isolate, attenuate, inactivate, and fractionate the target pathogen in order to produce vaccine antigens. Although the majority of the human and veterinary vaccines currently in use were created using these methods, they were effectively "educated guessing," particularly when it came to understanding the protective host immune response. Recombinant DNA technology's introduction in the early 1970s was a significant development that had an impact on all branches of biology. It also signaled the start of the so-called rational era of vaccine development by enabling the synthesis of genetic sequences, manipulation of pathogen genomes, and expression of recombinant proteins in formats that closely resembled those expressed during natural infection, thereby removing the dependence on pathogen growth for vaccine production.

Veterinary Vaccine Opportunities

The adoption of platform technologies in human medicine has accelerated significantly as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. More than 300 vaccinations are now under development, with more than 100 of them through clinical trials, according to the vaccine tracker run by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. The thorough understanding of how these many platforms operate against the same disease in terms of protection and related immune responses will be an extraordinary scientific result of our efforts. By enabling well-informed decisions to be made on the future deployment of these platforms in human and veterinary vaccination, this will have significant positive effects on One Health. Various platform technologies trigger various immunological reactions. This knowledge, along with knowledge about the pathogen, knowledge of the protective host immune response, and development of the desired TPP, can be used to make well-informed judgments about the design of innovative vaccines. Nonetheless, there is still room for improvement in the accessibility of thorough data on immunological responses to infection and immunization in veterinary species. The absence of veterinary immunological reagents has hindered such research, but this is currently being addressed through programs like the Immunological Toolbox. One Health will ultimately gain from these studies thorough knowledge of how various vaccination platform technologies perform across different animals. Above all, veterinary vaccinations must be usable by end users for adoption and application. Practicality is not one feature; rather, it is a collection of features that can interact with one another. For instance, the price of raw materials for production, the number of doses needed to induce protective immunity, and the infrastructure required for delivery will all affect the price of a vaccine (such as cold chain). A significant development in veterinary vaccine platform technologies is the potential for an efficient single-shot vaccine that might be administered intranasally to establish protective mucosal immunity in animals, such as the prototype BSRV polymeric nanoparticle vaccine.

Conclusion

For the benefits of One Health, including immunization, there is a need for increased veterinary understanding and the integration of knowledge on zoonotic hazards. The wellbeing of animals and food production systems are also directly impacted by non-zoonotic infectious diseases, which only affect animals. This is something we must be aware of. They can also have societal and environmental impacts that have an impact on people's health, happiness, and environment, such as climate change. Exciting new opportunities to control animal diseases and have wider One Health advantages are presented by the timely adoption of proposed regulatory laws with the ability to hasten registration of veterinary vaccinations based on well-defined platform technology.

Search This Blog

Journal Series