COVID Vaccine: What does it do? Does it do anything? Let’s find out.

/ Thomas Harper

I made a video going over some of the basic biochemistry of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and how the Pfizer/BioNTech BNT162b2 RNA vaccine is supposed to work.

Resources and References:

A prefusion SARS-CoV-2 spike RNA vaccine is highly immunogenic and prevents lung infection in non-human primates

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.09.08.280818v1.full.pdf

Guidelines on clinical evaluation of vaccines: regulatory expectations

https://www.who.int/biologicals/expert_committee/Clinical_changes_IK_final.pdf

Decoding the SARS-CoV-2 Genomes – Origin

https://blogs.3ds.com/biovia/decoding-the-sars-cov-2-genomes-origin/

Probable Pangolin Origin of SARS-CoV-2 Associated with the COVID-19 Outbreak

https://www.cell.com/current-biology/pdfExtended/S0960-9822(20)30360-2

Genomic variance of the 2019-nCoV coronavirus

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/jmv.25700

The Human Coronavirus Disease COVID-19: Its Origin, Characteristics, and Insights into Potential Drugs and Its Mechanisms

https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0817/9/5/331

Humanized mice develop coronavirus respiratory disease

https://www.pnas.org/content/102/23/8073

Structural and functional conservation of the programmed −1 ribosomal frameshift signal of SARS-CoV-2

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7310627/

Crystal structure of SARS-CoV-2 papain-like protease

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211383520306985

Distinct conformational states of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/369/6511/1586

Broad-Spectrum Coronavirus Fusion Inhibitors to Combat COVID-19 and Other Emerging Coronavirus Diseases

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7311999/

Fusion mechanism of 2019-nCoV and fusion inhibitors targeting HR1 domain in spike protein

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41423-020-0374-2

Cryo-EM structure of the SARS coronavirus spike glycoprotein in complex with its host cell receptor ACE2

https://journals.plos.org/plospathogens/article?id=10.1371/journal.ppat.1007236

Antivirals Against Coronaviruses: Candidate Drugs for SARS-CoV-2 Treatment?

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2020.01818/full

A Multibasic Cleavage Site in the Spike Protein of SARS-CoV-2 Is Essential for Infection of Human Lung Cells

https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S1097-2765%2820%2930264-1

TMPRSS2 and furin are both essential for proteolytic activation of SARS-CoV-2 in human airway cells

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7383062/

mRNA vaccines — a new era in vaccinology

https://www.nature.com/articles/nrd.2017.243

The promise of mRNA vaccines: a biotech and industrial perspective

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41541-020-0159-8

Enlisting the mRNA Vaccine Platform to Combat Parasitic Infections

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6963228/

Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells: A Brief Review

https://www.stemexpress.com/blogs/peripheral-blood-mononuclear-cells/

PDB Codes:

6VXX – SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein (pre-fusion conformation)

6VYB – SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein (pre-fusion conformation)

6VW1 – SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein (pre-fusion conformation)

6ACK – SARS-CoV Spike Protein + Human ACE2

6XRA – SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein (post-fusion conformation)