DNA vaccine protection against SARS-CoV-2 in rhesus macaques.

Jingyou Yu Lisa H Tostanoski Lauren Peter Noe B Mercado Katherine A McMahan Shant H Mahrokhian Joseph P Nkolola Jinyan LiuZhenfeng LiAbishek ChandrashekarDavid R MartinezCarolin Loos Caroline G Atyeo Stephanie Fischinger John S Burke Matthew D SleinYuezhou ChenAdam Zuiani Felipe J N LelisMeghan TraversShaghayegh Habibi Laurent Pessiant Alex Van Ry Kelvin BladeRenita BrownAnthony CookBrad Finneyfrock Alan DodsonElyse TeowJason VelascoRoland C Zahn Frank Wegmann Esther A Bondzie Gabriel Dagotto Makda S GebreXuan HeCatherine Jacob-DolanMarinela KirilovaNicole E KordanaZijin LinLori F MaxfieldFelix NampanyaRamya Nityanandam John D Ventura Huahua Wan Yongfei Cai Bing Chen Aaron G Schmidt Duane R Wesemann Ralph S Baric Galit Alter Hanne A Elyard Mark G Lewis Dan H Barouch

Published in: Science (New York, N.Y.) (2020)

The global coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has made the development of a vaccine a top biomedical priority. In this study, we developed a series of DNA vaccine candidates expressing different forms of the SARS-CoV-2 spike (S) protein and evaluated them in 35 rhesus macaques. Vaccinated animals developed humoral and cellular immune responses, including neutralizing antibody titers at levels comparable to those found in convalescent humans and macaques infected with SARS-CoV-2. After vaccination, all animals were challenged with SARS-CoV-2, and the vaccine encoding the full-length S protein resulted in >3.1 and >3.7 log10 reductions in median viral loads in bronchoalveolar lavage and nasal mucosa, respectively, as compared with viral loads in sham controls. Vaccine-elicited neutralizing antibody titers correlated with protective efficacy, suggesting an immune correlate of protection. These data demonstrate vaccine protection against SARS-CoV-2 in nonhuman primates.

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