Yellow fever (YF) causes an acute hemorrhagic fever disease in tropical Africa and Latin America. The YF vaccine YF17D is available and is prepared in eggs. Shortages of the YF17D vaccine and rare adverse effects have been reported.
To develop a novel YF vaccine, Medigen applied iDNA technology. The iDNA represents genetically stable DNA that encodes the full-length RNA genome of YF17D vaccine. The vaccine was designed to launch YF17D-like vaccine virus in vitro or in vivo. Safety of the vaccine was confirmed in AG129 mice. Vaccination of mice resulted in seroconversion and elicitation of virus-specific neutralizing antibodies (Tretyakova et al., Virology, 2014).
Medigen publications:
Tretyakova I, Nickols B, Hidajat R, Jokinen J, Lukashevich IS, Pushko P. Plasmid DNA initiates replication of yellow fever vaccine in vitro and elicits virus-specific immune response in mice. Virology. 2014 Nov;468-470:28-35.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov /pubmed/25129436