Baculovirus as a vaccine vector

Abstract

Baculovirus is extensively utilized as an excellent tool for production of recombinant protein in insect cells. Baculovirus infects insects in nature and is non-pathogenic to humans. In addition to insect cells, baculovirus is capable of transducing a broad range of animal cells. Due to its biosafety, large cloning capacity, low cytotoxicity, and non-replication nature in the transduced cells as well as the ease of manipulation and production, baculovirus has been utilized as RNA interference mediators, gene delivery vectors, and vaccine vectors for a wide variety of applications. This article focuses on the utilization of baculoviruses as vaccine vectors to prepare antigen or subunit vaccines.

Figure 1. Schematic illustration of polycistronic vectors carrying multiple expression cassettes. The vectors carrying three (A) or five (B) expression cassettes are shown. The pBaculovirus Dual display vector contains three expression cassettes. The sequences coding for gp64 SS-His6-A target gene-gp64 TM-gp64 CTD and gp64 SS-His6-B target gene-gp64 TM-gp64 CTD, which can display two different proteins on viral envelop or plasma membrane under the control of baculovirus p10 and polyhedron promoters. The pBaculovirus multiple display vector carries five expression cassettes as shown in the diagram. The target gene can be expressed under the control of the P₁₀ promoter or polyhedrin promoters while and EGFP gene with cytomegalovirus promoter is expressed under the control of the polyhedrin promoter. The EGFP is expressed in host cells for rapid identification of recombinant baculovirus while target proteins are displayed on the baculovirus envelope or plasma membrane.