Immunoinformatics design of novel peptide vaccines against Epstein-Barr virus with over 99% global population coverage: A Reverse Vaccinology approach

Abstract

Abstract Background Epstein-Barr virus is commonly known as human herpes virus 4; an oncovirus belonging to the herpes virus family. The pathogen is extremely ubiquitous and infects more than 90% of population once in a lifetime. Methods The current study has employed a computational pipeline to develop a multiepitope vaccine design by targeting the most antigenic glycoproteins of the virus. The proteins were separately processed to retrieve B-cell and T-cell epitopes. The most suitable epitopes were scrutinized to design the peptide vaccine using appropriate linkers and adjuvants. The designed chimeric vaccines were further analyzed for their molecular interactions with TLR-4 and CD21 receptor. Consequently, the structural motion of the docked complexes was analyzed by molecular dynamics simulation approach followed by immune simulation. Results Our results showed promising outcomes in terms of vaccine antigenicity, population coverage and significantly lower free binding energies with potential receptors tested on 4 different docking platforms. Conclusion The conducted in silico study concludes that peptide vaccines could be a suitable alternative to traditional vaccinology approaches. Hence, our study will aid in the better formulation of vaccines in future by targeting the suitable drug or vaccine candidates.