Protein Engineering for Universal Vaccines
Research Focus
Current influenza vaccines target the strain-specific hemagglutinin (HA) head domain, and require annual reformulation due to antigenic drift. Redirecting immunity toward the conserved HA stem domain could enable a universal vaccine effective across strains. In the Kim Lab, I designed and tested an H7 hemagglutinin head variant with 10 engineered glycosylation sites intended to shield the head from antibody recognition and potentially redirect the immune response toward the stem.
Key Findings
H7+10 head mutant showed ablated binding to most well-characterized head antibodies, supporting the glycan-shielding hypothesis. One antibody (22-3E05) retained binding, revealing a gap in the glycan shield and a clear direction for further engineering. Neither H7 nor H7+10 constructs bound stem antibodies, confirming sample identity and purity.