Virologists of Pittsburgh are seen in a press conference. Image Courtesy –www.mankatofreepress.com
Pittsburgh virologists claimed that they have not only created vaccine candidate, but they are getting good results on a clinical trial. This is yet to be applied on the human body within a short span of time.
The scientists at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pennsylvania claimed that clinical trial of vaccine candidate has become successful on rats. The vaccine produced a strong antibody to SARS-Cov-2 in a rat’s body. Pittsburgh virologists claim not only vaccine candidates, clinical trials have begun to yield good results.
A ‘candidate vaccine virus’ is usually an influenza virus that has been made by ‘Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’ or another public health partner that can be used by vaccine manufacturers to manufacture a flu vaccine. The ‘Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’ is a US agency having responsibilities of tracking and investigating public health tendency. This agency is an integral part of the ‘Public Health Services’ in the US under the department of ‘Health and Human Services’ in Atlanta, Georgia.
This research article is published in the weekly medical journal ‘The Lancet’. The scientists told that a long-term vaccine would be produced from this vaccine candidate. It has been assumed that the vaccine will produce the same antibodies in corona affected the human body because of its effectiveness in a rat’s body.
Andrea Gambotto, Associate Professor at the Department of Surgery, Pittsburgh School of Medicine, told that vaccines for SARS-CoV in 2003 and MERS-CoV in 2014 were also made at Pittsburg. In his words, “We have seen fears of the two previous epidemics. The vaccine was still being studied. The SARS-CoV-2 virus has similarities with SARS and MARS viruses. So, it has been speculated how the new virus vaccine candidate will be.” He told that the vaccine could be applied to humans within the next two weeks.
Scientists say that the vaccine is made like this – the whole virus or the viral proteins are injected into a living body by purifying the surface protein of the virus. Function of the viral protein is to build up ‘Memory B’ cells in the living body. These ‘Memory B’ cells recognize viral proteins very well. And it produces a lot of antibodies against it. This process is called making ‘antibody-based immune response’ or ‘adaptive immune response’. Just like activating the body cells to prepare antibody by injecting ‘viral protein’ or ‘pathogen’ from outside; as well as identifying such harmful viral proteins, so that such cells can be alerted when they see a deadly virus protein in future. And then the body cells can be activated to prepare antibodies to prevent the deadly virus.
According to virologist Louis Falo of the Pittsburgh School of Medicine, the Pittsburgh Coronavirus vaccine claims to be more useful than the experimental mRNA vaccine candidate. He told that SARS-Cove-2 viral proteins have been identified in the lab to create viral proteins that would enhance the immune system by producing powerful antibodies to the body. Not only Covid-19, but the vaccine would also be used to prevent any infectious viral disease in the coming days.
According to Lewis Falo, this viral protein has been injected into the skin cells with a microneedle array (a patch of 400 tiny needles). This protein has been shown to stimulate the production of antibodies in rats. Scientists say that antibodies have been produced within two weeks of injecting viral proteins, which will hopefully prevent the infection in the human body if the trial becomes successful.
