{"id":161281,"date":"2023-03-29T22:24:57","date_gmt":"2023-03-30T03:24:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/03\/method-for-improving-seasonal-flu-vaccines-also-aids-pandemic-prediction"},"modified":"2023-03-29T22:24:57","modified_gmt":"2023-03-30T03:24:57","slug":"method-for-improving-seasonal-flu-vaccines-also-aids-pandemic-prediction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/03\/method-for-improving-seasonal-flu-vaccines-also-aids-pandemic-prediction","title":{"rendered":"Method for improving seasonal flu vaccines also aids pandemic prediction"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/method-for-improving-seasonal-flu-vaccines-also-aids-pandemic-prediction2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Improving the seasonal influenza vaccine and public health specialists\u2019 ability to predict pandemic potential in new flu strains may be possible, due to new findings from scientists at St. Jude Children\u2019s Research Hospital. The key is the stability of a viral protein that gains entry into human cells. The findings were published today in Science Advances.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe found that the protein flu viruses use to enter cells, hemagglutinin, needs to be relatively stable and resistant to acid in an effective H3N2 flu vaccine,\u201d said senior and co-corresponding author Charles Russell, Ph.D., St. Jude Department of Infectious Diseases. \u201cWe found a mutation in hemagglutinin that makes the <a href=\"https:\/\/medicalxpress.com\/tags\/virus\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">virus<\/a> grow better in eggs also causes a mismatch in the vaccine. The mutation makes the virus unstable and makes it look less human-like.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The H3N2 virus is a subtype of Influenza A and is one of the culprits behind the seasonal flu. Many flu vaccines are made by growing the virus in chicken eggs, but the virus can gain mutations during that process. Some of those changes, like the one uncovered by the St. Jude group, make the vaccine less effective in generating the ideal immune response. At the same time, other mutations have more beneficial impacts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Improving the seasonal influenza vaccine and public health specialists\u2019 ability to predict pandemic potential in new flu strains may be possible, due to new findings from scientists at St. Jude Children\u2019s Research Hospital. The key is the stability of a viral protein that gains entry into human cells. The findings were published today in Science [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1495],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-161281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161281\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}