Department of Medical Life Science, Kyushu University of Health and Welfare, Nobeoka, Japan.
Institute of Immunology, Junsei Educational Institute, Nobeoka, Miyazaki, Japan.
Hum Vaccin Immunother. 2021 Aug 3;17(8):2808-2813. doi: 10.1080/21645515.2021.1880210. Epub 2021 Mar 2.
Conventional vaccines to combat COVID-19 through different approaches are at various stages of development. The complexity of COVID-19 such as the potential mutations of the virus leading to antigenic drift and the uncertainty on the duration of the immunity induced by the vaccine have hampered the efforts to control the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, we suggest an alternative interim treatment strategy based on biological response modifier glucans such as the AFO-202-derived β-glucan, which has been reported to induce trained immunity, akin to that induced by the Bacille Calmette-Guérin vaccine, by epigenetic modifications at the central level in the bone marrow. These β-glucans act as pathogen-associated molecular patterns, activating mucosal immunity by binding with specific pathogen recognition receptors such as dectin-1 and inducing both the adaptive and innate immunity by reaching distant lymphoid organs. β-Glucans have also been used as immune adjuvants for vaccines such as the influenza vaccine. Therefore, until a conventional vaccine is widely available, an orally consumable vaccine adjuvant that acts like biosimilars, termed as the wide-spectrum immune-balancing food-supplement-based enteric (β-WIFE) vaccine adjuvant approach, with well-reported safety is worth in-depth investigation and can be considered for a clinical trial.
针对 COVID-19 的常规疫苗通过不同方法正在处于不同的开发阶段。COVID-19 的复杂性，例如病毒的潜在突变导致抗原漂移，以及疫苗诱导的免疫持续时间的不确定性，阻碍了控制 COVID-19 大流行的努力。因此，我们建议基于生物反应调节剂葡聚糖（如 AFO-202 衍生的β-葡聚糖）的替代临时治疗策略，据报道，这种葡聚糖通过在骨髓中央水平的表观遗传修饰，诱导类似于卡介苗疫苗诱导的训练免疫。这些β-葡聚糖作为病原体相关的分子模式，通过与特定的病原体识别受体（如 dectin-1）结合，激活黏膜免疫，并通过到达远处的淋巴器官来诱导适应性和固有免疫。β-葡聚糖也已被用作流感疫苗等疫苗的免疫佐剂。因此，在常规疫苗广泛应用之前，一种可口服的、具有类似生物类似物作用的疫苗佐剂，称为广谱免疫平衡的基于食物补充的肠内（β-WIFE）疫苗佐剂方法，具有良好的安全性，值得深入研究，并可考虑进行临床试验。
