Abstract
African swine fever (ASF) is a viral disease of domestic and wild suids for which there is currently no vaccine or treatment available. The recent spread of ASF virus (ASFV) through Europe and Asia is causing enormous economic and animal losses. Unfortunately, the measures taken so far are insufficient and an effective vaccine against ASFV needs to be urgently developed. We hypothesized that immunization with a cocktail of thirty-five rationally selected antigens would improve the protective efficacy of subunit vaccine prototypes given that the combination of fewer immunogenic antigens (between 2 and 22) has failed to elicit protective efficacy. To this end, immunogenicity and efficacy of thirty-five adenovirus-vectored ASFV antigens were evaluated in wild boar. The treated animals were divided into different groups to test the use of BioMize adjuvant and different inoculation strategies. Forty-eight days after priming, the nine treated and two control wild boar were challenged with the virulent ASFV Arm07 isolate. All animals showed clinical signs and pathological findings consistent with ASF. This lack of protection is in line with other studies with subunit vaccine prototypes, demonstrating that there is still much room for improvement to obtain an effective subunit ASFV vaccine.
Highlights
African swine fever (ASF) is a viral disease of domestic and wild suids for which there is currently no vaccine or treatment available
Only one of the nine treated animals, which belonged to the T1 group, was positive for anti-ASF virus (ASFV) antibodies at 12 dpp, this antibody response was temporary and it did not remain in the sampling
The lack of protection observed in this study with an inoculation of thirty-five Ad5-ASFV antigens cocktail, including novel antigens associated with high immune response and a modified CD2v relevant for protection [19,35,36,37,38], is in line with previous outcomes from domestic pigs immunized with nine and six Ad5-ASFV antigens cocktails [19]
Summary
African swine fever (ASF) is a viral disease of domestic and wild suids for which there is currently no vaccine or treatment available. Pathogens 2020, 9, 171 spread of current ASFV outbreaks and eradication are based on rapid virus detection and establishment of strict sanitary measures, including animal stamping out and regional, national, and international trade restrictions [1]. These result in important direct costs and export losses leading to a great socioeconomic impact in affected regions. These control measures are insufficient where wild boar are widely affected [6] such as in the European Union, where wild boar represents more than 90% of the outbreaks reported [3], and the outbreaks in domestic pigs are sporadic and related to the presence of ASFV in wild boar [7]
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
