Preclinical development of a cross-protective β-SARS-CoV-2 virus-like particle vaccine adjuvanted with MF59

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Author notes

1. These authors contributed equally: Linda Earnest, Daniel Fernandez Ruiz, Melissa A. Edeling.

Authors and Affiliations

1. Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Melbourne, at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity Parkville, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

   Linda Earnest, Daniel Fernandez Ruiz, Melissa A. Edeling, Julio Carrera Montoya, Ashley Huey Yiing Yap, Chinn Yi Wong, Lauren E. Holz, Simon Collett, Samantha L. Grimley, Damian F. J. Purcell, Dale I. Godfrey, Danielle E. Anderson, Kanta Subbarao, Jason M. Mackenzie, Steven Rockman, William R. Heath & Joseph Torresi

2. School of Biomedical Sciences, Faculty of Medicine & Health and the UNSW RNA Institute, The University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW, Australia

   Daniel Fernandez Ruiz

3. Infection and Immunity Program, La Trobe Institute for Molecular Science (LIMS), La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC, Australia

   Stephanie Gras

4. Department of Biochemistry and Chemistry, School of Agriculture, Biomedicine and Environment, La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC, Australia

   Stephanie Gras

5. Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Monash University, Clayton, VIC, Australia

   Stephanie Gras

6. Department of Paediatrics, University of Melbourne Parkville, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

   Simon Collett

7. School of Science, College of Science, Engineering and Health, RMIT University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

   Simon Collett

8. Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

   James P. Cooney, Kathryn C. Davidson & Marc Pellegrini

9. Department of Medical Biology, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

   James P. Cooney, Kathryn C. Davidson & Marc Pellegrini

10. Victorian Infectious Diseases Reference Laboratory, Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, Royal Melbourne Hospital, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    Jason Roberts, Jamie Mumford, Elizabeth Vincan & Danielle E. Anderson

11. Programme in Emerging Infectious Diseases, Duke-NUS Medical School, Singapore, Singapore

    Chee Wah Tan & Lin-Fa Wang

12. Infectious Diseases Translational Research Programme, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Chee Wah Tan & Lin-Fa Wang

13. Center for Pathogen Research, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Matthew Frieman

14. Research, Innovation & Commercialisation, Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry & Health Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

    Dhiraj Hans

15. Curtin Medical School, Curtin University, Perth, WA, Australia

    Elizabeth Vincan

16. WHO Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza, VIDRL at the Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    Kanta Subbarao

17. Centenary Institute, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia

    Marc Pellegrini

18. Vaccine Innovation Unit, Seqirus/CSL, Parkville, VIC, Australia

    Steven Rockman

Contributions

Investigation and formal data analysis: M.A.E., D.F.Z., L.E., J.C.M., A.H.Y.Y., C.Y.W., L.E.H., S.C., J.P.C., K.C.D., S.L.G., D.F.J.P., M.F., D.I.G., J.R., J.M., C.W.T., L.F.W., D.E.A., K.S., M.P., W.R.H., J.T. Resources: D.F.R., L.E,H., S.G., J.P.C., K.C.D., S.L.G., J.R., J.M., C.W.T., L.F.W., D.E.A., J.T. Project administration: C.Y.W., D.H., J.M.M., E.V., S.R., W.R.H., J.T. Conceptualisation: M.A.E., L.E., J.M.M., D.I.G., E.V., S.R., W.R.H., J.T. Supervision: M.A.E., L.E., K.S., M.P., J.M.M., E.V., S.R., W.R.H., J.T. Writing—original draft: M.A.E, D.F.R, J.T. Writing—reviewing and editing: All authors. Verification of data: M.A.E., D.F.R., L.E., J.C.M., K.C.D., J.R., C.W.T., L.F.W., M.F., D.E.A., J.T. All authors read and approved the final version of the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Joseph Torresi.

Competing interests

Two patents (PCT/AU2022/050844 and PCT/AU2022/050843) covering the SARS-CoV-2 VLP vaccines and the underlying technology described in this study have been submitted through The University of Melbourne, with D.I.G. and J.T. as co-inventors. C.W.T. and L.-F.W. are co-inventors of a patent on the surrogate virus neutralization test (sVNT) platform. S.R. is an employee of CSL Seqirus. The authors declare no competing interests.

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