Emergence of immune escape at dominant SARS-CoV-2 killer T cell epitope
Garry Dolton, Cristina Rius, Md Samiul Hasan, Aaron Wall, Barbara Szomolay, Enas M. Behiry, Thomas Whalley, Joel Southgate, Anna Fuller, Théo Morin, Katie Topley, Li Rong Tan, Philip Goulder, O. Brad Spiller, P.J. Rizkallah, Lucy C. Jones, Thomas R. Connor, Andrew K. Sewell
Abstract
convalescent patients and individuals vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2, despite these responses comprising of over 175 different individual T cell receptors. Viral escape at prevalent T cell epitopes restricted by high frequency HLAs may be particularly problematic when vaccine immunity is focused on a single protein such as SARS-CoV-2 Spike, providing a strong argument for inclusion of multiple viral proteins in next generation vaccines and highlighting the need for monitoring T cell escape in new SARS-CoV-2 variants.