From Medical Xpress
November 4, 2020
Where Aedes mosquitoes fly, Zika virus may not be far behind. Although the explosive 2015-2016 Zika epidemics in the Americas are behind us, Zika may re-emerge, and “in many countries, Zika may be spreading in silence,” says Sujan Shresta, Ph.D., a professor at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI). “We need to develop effective vaccines.”
In a new Science Advances study, Shresta and her colleagues at LJI report that the immune system’s T cells have the power to prevent Zika infection in mice. This finding suggests that effective Zika vaccines need to activate T cells to work alongside antibodies.
“If we combine T cells and antibodies, we have even stronger protection and longer-term protection,” says Annie Elong Ngono, Ph.D., a postdoctoral fellow at LJI and first author of the new study.