Abstract
Bovine ephemeral fever virus (BEFV) is an overlooked pathogen, recently gaining widespread attention owing to its associated enormous economic impacts affecting the global livestock industries. High endemicity with rapid spread and morbidity greatly impacts bovine species, demanding adequate attention towards BEFV prophylaxis. Currently, a few suboptimum vaccines are prevailing, but were confined to local strains with limited protection. Therefore, we designed a highly efficacious multi-epitope vaccine candidate targeted against the geographically distributed BEFV population. By utilizing immunoinformatics technology, all structural proteins were targeted for B- and T-cell epitope prediction against the entire allele population of BoLA molecules. Prioritized epitopes were adjoined by linkers and adjuvants to effectively induce both cellular and humoral immune responses in bovine. Subsequently, the in silico construct was characterized for its physicochemical parameters, high immunogenicity, least allergenicity, and non-toxicity. The 3D modeling, refinement, and validation of ligand (vaccine construct) and receptor (bovine TLR7) then followed molecular docking and molecular dynamic simulation to validate their stable interactions. Moreover, in silico cloning of codon-optimized vaccine construct in the prokaryotic expression vector (pET28a) was explored. This is the first time HTL epitopes have been predicted using bovine datasets. We anticipate that the designed construct could be an effective prophylactic remedy for the BEF disease that may pave the way for future laboratory experiments.
Highlights
Bovine ephemeral fever virus (BEFV) is a widespread and economically significant cattle pathogen associated with bovine ephemeral fever (BEF) disease
BEFV cause heavy loss to cattle farming in multiple fronts including milk, meat, traction losses at the field, and restriction of international livestock trade
We identified highly antigenic epitopes (B-cell, cytotoxic T-lymphocyte (CTL), and helper T-lymphocyte (HTL) epitopes) of viral proteins and explored for sequence conservancy among all BEFV isolates
Summary
Bovine ephemeral fever virus (BEFV) is a widespread and economically significant cattle pathogen associated with bovine ephemeral fever (BEF) disease. The disease has shown enhanced pathogenicity, spreading to newer geographical regions in recent years [3,4]. BEFV outbreaks are perceptible during monsoon onset, coinciding with vectors’ propagation (Culicoides biting midges and mosquitoes) and spreading the disease [5,6]. Affected cows show a significant reduction in quality and quantity of milk production, often develop milk withdrawal, and in some cases abort the fetus in the third trimester. The virus predominantly targets crossbred and healthy cattle and water buffaloes [8]. BEFV cause heavy loss to cattle farming in multiple fronts including milk, meat, traction losses at the field, and restriction of international livestock trade
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