Parasites, Hosts and Diseases

The Korea Society for Parasitology and Tropical Medicine (대한기생충학·열대의학회)
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Virus-like particles expressing microneme-associated antigen of Plasmodium berghei confer better protection than those expressing apical membrane antigen 1

  • Min-Ju Kim (Department of Biomedical Science, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University) ;
  • Ki Back Chu (Department of Parasitology, Inje University College of Medicine) ;
  • Keon-Woong Yoon (Department of Biomedical Science, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University) ;
  • Hae-Ji Kang (Department of Microbiology, Dongguk University College of Medicine) ;
  • Dong-Hun Lee (Department of Biomedical Science, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University) ;
  • Eun-Kyung Moon (Department of Medical Zoology, Kyung Hee University School of Medicine) ;
  • Fu-Shi Quan (Department of Medical Zoology, Kyung Hee University School of Medicine)
  • Received : 2024.03.07
  • Accepted : 2024.04.18
  • Published : 2024.05.31
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Abstract

Malaria is a global disease affecting a large portion of the world's population. Although vaccines have recently become available, their efficacies are suboptimal. We generated virus-like particles (VLPs) that expressed either apical membrane antigen 1 (AMA1) or microneme-associated antigen (MIC) of Plasmodium berghei and compared their efficacy in BALB/c mice. We found that immune sera acquired from AMA1 VLP- or MIC VLP-immunized mice specifically interacted with the antigen of choice and the whole P. berghei lysate antigen, indicating that the antibodies were highly parasite-specific. Both VLP vaccines significantly enhanced germinal center B cell frequencies in the inguinal lymph nodes of mice compared with the control, but only the mice that received MIC VLPs showed significantly enhanced CD4+ T cell responses in the blood following P. berghei challenge infection. AMA1 and MIC VLPs significantly suppressed TNF-α and interleukin-10 production but had a negligible effect on interferon-γ. Both VLPs prevented excessive parasitemia buildup in immunized mice, although parasite burden reduction induced by MIC VLPs was slightly more effective than that induced by AMA1. Both VLPs were equally effective at preventing body weight loss. Our findings demonstrated that the MIC VLP was an effective inducer of protection against murine experimental malaria and should be the focus of further development.

Keywords

Acknowledgement

This study was financially supported by the Core Research Institute (CRI) Program, the Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF), Ministry of Education (NRF2018R1A6A1A03025124).

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