mRNA vaccines for COVID-19: what, why and how

The Coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus -2 (SARS-CoV-2), has impacted human lives in the most profound ways with millions of infections and deaths. Scientists and pharmaceutical companies have been in race to produce vaccines against SA...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	International journal of biological sciences 2021-01, Vol.17 (6), p.1446-1460
Main Authors:	Park, Jung Woo, Lagniton, Philip N P, Liu, Yu, Xu, Ren-He
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Clinical trials Coronaviruses COVID-19 COVID-19 - epidemiology COVID-19 - prevention & control COVID-19 Vaccines - administration & dosage Gene expression Humans Immune response Immune response (humoral) Immune system Infectious diseases Innate immunity Kinases mRNA mRNA vaccines Mutation Pandemics Review RNA, Messenger - genetics SARS-CoV-2 - genetics Severe acute respiratory syndrome Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 Vaccination Vaccine development Vaccines Viral diseases Viruses
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Summary:	The Coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus -2 (SARS-CoV-2), has impacted human lives in the most profound ways with millions of infections and deaths. Scientists and pharmaceutical companies have been in race to produce vaccines against SARS-CoV-2. Vaccine generation usually demands years of developing and testing for efficacy and safety. However, it only took less than one year to generate two mRNA vaccines from their development to deployment. The rapid production time, cost-effectiveness, versatility in vaccine design, and clinically proven ability to induce cellular and humoral immune response have crowned mRNA vaccines with spotlights as most promising vaccine candidates in the fight against the pandemic. In this review, we discuss the general principles of mRNA vaccine design and working mechanisms of the vaccines, and provide an up-to-date summary of pre-clinical and clinical trials on seven anti-COVID-19 mRNA candidate vaccines, with the focus on the two mRNA vaccines already licensed for vaccination. In addition, we highlight the key strategies in designing mRNA vaccines to maximize the expression of immunogens and avoid intrinsic innate immune response. We also provide some perspective for future vaccine development against COVID-19 and other pathogens.
ISSN:	1449-2288 1449-2288