Research on nanodelivery systems for nasal vaccine

Nasal administration has great advantage for stimulating the immune system, such as stimulating local and systemic protective immunity. However, delivery systems and adjuvants are often necessary to improve the efficacy of the intranasal vaccine. We applied nanoparticle technology to deliver a universal influenza vaccine via the nasal route in a European FP7 project called UniVacFlu.We evaluated different nanoparticles to search the best nanocarrier for an intranasal vaccine. Here we compared 5 types of nanoparticles with different surface charges (anionic or cationic) and various inner compositions as potential vectors: cationic and anionic liposomes, cationic and anionic PLGA (Poly Lactic co-Glycolic Acid) nanoparticles and zwitterionic maltodextrin nanoparticles (cationic surface with an anionic lipid core: NPL). We first quantified their nasal residence time after nasal administration in mice using in vivo live imaging and NPL showed the longest residence time. In vitro endocytosis on mucosal cells (airway epithelial cells, macrophages and dendritic cells) using labeled nanoparticles were performed by flow cytometry and confocal microscopy. Among the 5 nanoparticles, NPL were taken up to the greatest extent by the 3 different cell lines and the endocytosis mechanisms of NPL were characterized. In order to compare different nanoparticles as vaccine carriers, antigen loading and cell delivery were evaluated. In this study, we compared the loading and delivery of labeling ovalbumin with airway mucosa cells (airway epithelial cells, macrophages and dendritic cells) by flow cytometry. Our data showed that NPL were the best candidate that can payload with highest amount of protein and eventually the most efficient cellular protein delivery capacity. Taken together, our study revealed that among 5 nanoparticles, NPL were the best nanocarrier that own longer nasal residence time, efficiently uptake and deliver protein into airway epithelium. NPL were then selected as nanocarrier for the UniVac Flu project.The flu antigens CTA1-3M2e-DD and HA were formulated with NPL. The CTA1-3M2e-DD is an adjuvanted antigen composed of the A1 subunit of cholera toxin and a conserved epitope of influenza A virus (M2e), as well as the dimer of the synthetic analogue of Staphylococcus aureus protein A (DD) used to target B cells. To improve antigenic effect, recombinant HA from H1N1 was combined with CTA1-3M2e-DD. These formulations were evaluated in mice by the UniVacFlu consortium. We observed that CTA1-3M2e-DD and HA loaded into NPL could be a promising universal intranasal influenza vaccine.