Biopharming: the next DNA vaccine might come from tobacco!

In a recently published paper, Professor Ed Rybicki (IDM Member and of the Dept. Molecular and Cell Biology, Science Faculty, UCT) and his colleagues record the first demonstration of the potential of plants to make DNA vaccines.

In a pioneering step towards using plants to produce vaccines against cervical cancer and other diseases caused by viruses, Professor Rybicki and colleagues have generated synthetic human papillomavirus-derived viral particles called pseudovirions in tobacco plants.  This is the first time researchers have successfully created pseudovirions in plants, until now, only created in yeast or mammalian cell cultures. "We've succeeded in making a completely mammalian viral particle in a plant - proteins, DNA, everything. That's enormously exciting," says Dr Inga Hitzeroth of the Biopharming Research Unit (BRU) at UCT which is directed by Prof Rybicki.

For more details see:
'Production of Human papillomavirus pseudovirions in plants and their use in pseudovirion-based neutralisation assays in mammalian cells'. Scientific Reports 6: 20431, by RL Lamprecht, P Kennedy, SM Huddy, S Bethke, M Hendrikse, I Hitzeroth & EP Rybicki.

Dr Anne Meyers, Prof Ed Rybicki, & Dr Inga Hitzeroth of the
Biopharming Research Unit (BRU) with young tobacco plants