Current Status of COVID-19 Vaccine Development: Focusing on Antigen Design and Clinical Trials on Later Stages

Pureum Lee; Chang-Ung Kim; Sang Hawn Seo; Doo-Jin Kim

doi:10.4110/in.2021.21.e4

Current Status of COVID-19 Vaccine Development: Focusing on Antigen Design and Clinical Trials on Later Stages

Immune Netw. 2021 Feb 26;21(1):e4. doi: 10.4110/in.2021.21.e4. eCollection 2021 Feb.

Authors

Pureum Lee^{1

2}, Chang-Ung Kim^{1

3}, Sang Hawn Seo⁴, Doo-Jin Kim^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Infectious Disease Research Center, Korea Research Institute of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Daejeon 34141, Korea.
² Department of Bioscience, University of Science and Technology (UST), Daejeon 34113, Korea.
³ Department of Biochemistry, Chungnam National University, Daejeon 34134, Korea.
⁴ International Vaccine Institute, Seoul 08826, Korea.

Abstract

The global outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is still threatening human health, economy, and social life worldwide. As a counteraction for this devastating disease, a number of vaccines are being developed with unprecedented speed combined with new technologies. As COVID-19 vaccines are being developed in the absence of a licensed human coronavirus vaccine, there remain further questions regarding the long-term efficacy and safety of the vaccines, as well as immunological mechanisms in depth. This review article discusses the current status of COVID-19 vaccine development, mainly focusing on antigen design, clinical trials in later stages, and immunological considerations for further study.

Keywords: Antibody-dependent enhancement; COVID-19; Pre-existing immunological memory; Prefusion-stabilized; VAERD; Vaccines.

Publication types

Review