Improving the production of emergency vaccines against emerging strains of Foot and MouthDisease Virus

Emerging strains of foot and mouth disease virus (FMDV) differ antigenically from commercial vaccine strains and threaten livestock. Production of vaccines from local FMDV isolates helps handling this threat. BHK suspension cells used for FMDV vaccine production require long adaptation of field isolates, accompanied by antigenic changes. Cells overexpressing an FMDV receptor reduce the need for adaptation but were not fully evaluated for vaccine production. Our research goals are: 1) shortening adaptation of field isolates to production cells while minimizing antigenic changes and 2) increasing the yields of virus production by overexpressing a viral protein that enhances virus replication.