Recombinant viruses expressing the foot-and-mouth disease virus capsid precursor polypeptide (P1) induce cellular but not humoral antiviral immunity and partial protection in pigs.

The importance of the induction of virus neutralizing antibodies to provide protection against foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) infection is well established. However, recent studies with recombinant adenovirus expressing the precursor polypeptide of the viral capsid (P1) indicate that cattle inoculated with this recombinant vector developed partial protection against FMDV infection, in the absence of a detectable specific humoral response. Other viral vectors have been widely used to induce protective immunity against many pathogens, and it has been reported that the use of different vectors for priming and boosting injections can provide a synergistic effect on this response. In this work, we determined the immunogenicity of two recombinant viruses (adenovirus and vaccinia) expressing P1-FMDV, administered either individually or sequentially, and the protection that they induced against FMDV challenge in pigs. A double immunization with the adeno-P1 virus was the most effective strategy at inducing protective immunity. In contrast to previous reports, the use of two different vectors for priming and boosting did not show a synergistic effect on the protection induced against FMD. Interestingly, immunized pigs developed FMDV-specific T cell responses but not detectable antibodies. Thus, the protection observed was likely to be mediated by a cellular immune response.