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ItalianoAustrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz announced in early February that the controversial vaccine from Russia, Sputnik V, would also be used in Austria if it were approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA). The renowned biotechnologist Reinhard Renneberg, lecturer at the MCI in Innsbruck, explains how Sputnik V works compared to other vaccines.
How is the vaccine structured?
The Russian vaccine - with the scientific name "Gam-COVID-Vac Lyo" - uses non-proliferative adenoviruses. These are harmless cold viruses. This so-called vector vaccine uses viruses as transporters ("vectors"). These are Trojan horses of genetic engineers.
These vectors transport the genetic information for spiky spikes (S-proteins) obtained in the laboratory from the Corona virus as transporters into the body of the vaccinated person.
The information for the S-protein is inserted into the DNA genome of these vectors, i.e. the Trojan horses. This is then read in the human cells. The vaccinated person now forms antibodies against the virus spike proteins newly produced by the body itself.
The Sputnik vaccine consists of two vectors: an adenovirus vector based on the adenovirus type 26 (AD 26), into which the corona spike protein gene has been integrated, and a component (AD 5) that contains the same gene analogously in the human adenovirus type 5. These are therefore two different transporters with the same content. Symbolically, there are TWO Trojan horses in the fight against the virus.
The first vaccine component starts as a so-called "primer" that triggers an initial immune response. The vaccinated patient first produces masses of virus spike proteins and then also the human antibodies against them. Thus, the body serves as a bioreactor. The second vaccine component is used as a "booster". It is supposed to boost the immune response even more.
Vaccines in comparison
Other countries also use the vector vaccine approach. For example, the Corona vaccine candidate Ad26 from Johnson & Johnson as well as AZD from the cooperation between Oxford University and Astra-Zeneca. The latter has meanwhile also been approved in the EU, but is proving less effective with regard to mutation B. 1.351, which was first discovered in Great Britain.
The special feature of Sputnik V
The vaccination strategy of Sputnik V is to give two vaccinations, each with a different adenovirus type (AD 26 is followed by AD 5). This is to prevent antibodies against the vectors from forming after the first vaccination and then weakening the effect of the second vaccination.
This also "confuses" the immune system, as there is now another Trojan horse on the way with the same DNA content. This strategy should also help the body focus on the content, rather than the transport envelope.
Antibodies that develop after the first vaccination could in fact prevent the second vectors from being taken up into the cells. This seems to be the problem with the lower efficacy of AstraZeneca's vaccine, which is currently only about 60%
Reports from the Russian manufacturer state that the vaccine's efficacy is supposed to be 91.4%. However, these data came from an interim analysis of the ongoing phase III clinical trial.
Despite initial criticism in Western countries, more and more voices are being raised, including in the Austrian government, that Sputnik-V is an effective vaccine in the fight against the coronavirus. The latest study results, as published in 'The Lancet', announce that 16 infections (0.1%) occurred in 14,964 vaccinated persons in a trial phase. Furthermore, the side effects of Sputnik V are moderate, the study says. Mostly flu-like symptoms, fatigue or pain at the injection site were reported.
The Master's degree programme in Biotechnology at the MCI is concerned with linking molecular and industrial biotechnology with a focus on biopharmaceutical applications, which are of utmost importance in the current Corona pandemic. Numerous international experts from academia and industry are represented as lecturers in this course.
Reinhard Renneberg
Reinhard Renneberg, born in 1951, studied chemistry at the Lomonossov University, Moscow. After graduating, he went to the Central Institute for Molecular Biology (ZIM) in Berlin-Buch, where he received his doctorate in 1978 and habilitated in 1991 in the field of biosensor technology. From 1991 to 1995 he headed the Department of Immunosensorics at the Fraunhofer Institute for Chemo- and Biosensorics (ICB), Münster. in 1994, he followed the call of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) as Full Professor of Analytical Biotechnology. Renneberg is also active as a company founder. He is the author of "Bioanalytics for Beginners" as well as "Biotechnology for Beginners", for which he received the literature prize of the Chemical Industry Fund in 2008. Since 2017, he has been teaching at the Unternehmerische Hochschule® in Innsbruck.