Understanding Characteristics of Broadly Neutralizing Antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 and Other Human Coronaviruses – A Recent Study
The original SARS-CoV-2 strain has given rise to many variants and subvariants of concern. One strategy employed to combat this crisis has been the use of broadly neutralizing antibodies for prophylactic and therapeutic purposes. Many such antibodies are currently in development, with a few having already received emergency use authorization.
The researchers discovered in their study that modifying antibodies that have already been identified can enhance their ability to neutralize and target a broader range. There are two main strategies for achieving this. The first involves creating diverse VH/VL sequence collections using techniques like phage or yeast display, resulting in antibodies that exhibit improved functionality. The second approach involves exploring alternative antibody formats, such as nanobodies.
Understanding the properties of broadly neutralizing antibodies can inform the development of more potent vaccines. Another viable approach for creating advanced vaccines would involve immunizing individuals with proteins from various human coronaviruses (HCoVs), known as heterologous or multivalent immunization. This method has the potential to stimulate the immune system to produce bNAbs targeting highly conserved viral epitopes from these coronaviruses.
Spear Bio’s NAB-Sure™ SARS-CoV-2 test kit simplifies testing for SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies (NAbs), producing qualitative and quantitative NAb titer measurements using real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The assay has the accuracy of cell-based assays like the plaque-reduction neutralization testing (PRNT), the gold standard for NAb detection, without the safety concerns and long, complicated workflows. Wild Type and Omicron BA.4/5, XBB.1.5, and BQ.1.1 variants test kits are available now.