Foot-and-mouth disease virus-like particle mRNA vaccine induces strong humoral and cellular immunity

Foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) is a major animal infectious disease that has garnered significant international attention. Currently, conventional inactivated vaccines and virus-like particle (VLP) vaccines primarily induce protective immune responses through the generation of neutralizing antibodies. However, these vaccines exhibit limited activation of cellular immunity and offer short-term immune persistence. Furthermore, inactivated vaccines raise certain biosafety concerns. In this study, an FMD mRNA vaccine capable of self-assembling into non-infectious VLP was developed. Immunization of mice demonstrated that this VLP mRNA vaccine not only elicited robust humoral immune responses with long-lasting antibody production but also effectively activated cellular immunity. In guinea pig challenge experiments, it provided immune protection comparable to that of traditional inactivated vaccines. The dual immune mechanism-simultaneously activating both humoral and cellular immunity-overcomes the limitations of traditional vaccines, making this VLP mRNA vaccine an innovative candidate for FMD control and providing a technical foundation for the development of VLP mRNA vaccines for other animal diseases. KEY POINTS: • A novel FMD mRNA vaccine that self-assembles into VLP was successfully developed. • The FMD VLP mRNA vaccine effectively stimulates both humoral and cellular immune responses. • The FMD VLP mRNA vaccine provides protective efficacy in guinea pig challenge models.