Current SARS-CoV-2 vaccines are losing efficacy against emerging variants and may not protect against future novel coronavirus outbreaks, emphasizing the need for more broadly protective vaccines. To inform the development of a pan-coronavirus vaccine, we investigated the presence and specificity of cross-reactive antibodies against the spike (S) proteins of human coronaviruses (hCoV) after SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccination. We found an 11- to 123-fold increase in antibodies binding to SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV as well as a 2- to 4-fold difference in antibodies binding to seasonal hCoVs in COVID-19 convalescent sera compared to pre-pandemic healthy donors, with the S2 subdomain of the S protein being the main target for cross-reactivity. In addition, we detected cross-reactive antibodies to all hCoV S proteins after SARS-CoV-2 vaccination in macaques and humans, with higher responses for hCoV more closely related to SARS-CoV-2. These findings support the feasibility of and provide guidance for development of a pan-coronavirus vaccine.
Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; antibodies; coronavirus; cross-reactivity; human; immunology; infectious disease; inflammation; microbiology; vaccine.
© 2021, Grobben et al.