Biography
Prof. Rui Gong
Prof. Rui Gong
Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Title: Engineering of Zika virus envelope protein as immunogen
Abstract: 

The envelope protein of Zika virus (ZIKV) exists as a dimer on the mature viral surface and is an attractive antiviral target because it mediates viral entry. However, recombinant soluble wildtype ZIKV envelope (wtZE) might preferentially exist as monomer (monZE). It has been shown that the A264C substitution could promote formation of dimeric ZIKV envelope protein (ZEA264C), requiring further characterization of purified ZEA264C for its potential applications in vaccine development (Metz SW., et al., Sci Rep., 2017). We also noted that ZEA264C, connected by disulfide bond, might be different from the noncovalent native envelope dimer on the virion surface. Since the antibody Fc fragment exists as dimer and is widely used for fusion-protein construction, here we fused wtZE to human immunoglobulin G1 (IgG1) Fc fragment (ZE-Fc) for noncovalent wtZE dimerization. Using a multistep purification procedure, we separated dimeric ZEA264C and ZE-Fc, revealing that they both exhibit typical β-sheet–rich secondary structures and stabilities similar to those of monZE. The binding activities of monZE, ZEA264C, and ZE-Fc to neutralizing antibodies targeting different epitopes indicated that ZEA264C and ZE-Fc could better mimic the native dimeric status, especially in terms of the formation of tertiary and quaternary epitopes. Both ZEA264C and ZE-Fc recognize a ZIKV-sensitive cell line as do monZE, indicating that the two constructs are still functional. Furthermore, a murine immunization assay disclose that ZEA264C and ZE-Fc elicit more neutralizing antibody responses than does monZE. These results suggest that the two immunogen candidates ZEA264C and ZE-Fc have potential utility for neutralizing antibody selection and vaccine design against ZIKV (Yang C., et al., J Biol Chem., 2019).

Biography: 
Rui Gong, Ph.D., Head of Antibody Engineering Group, Professor, Ph.D. Supervisor. Dr. Gong graduated from Wuhan University in 2002 and received his Ph.D. also in Wuhan University in 2007. He went to National Cancer Institute, National Institute of Health, USA in 2007 for his training as a postdoctoral fellow, and joined Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and established Antibody Engineering Group for antibody engineering-related research in 2012. Dr. Gong won Federal Technology Transfer Award (NIH, USA) in 2011 and 2012. He has about thirty publications and one international patent in application. He is hosting or hosted the grants of the Strategic Priority, Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Young Scientist Subject of the National High Technology Research and Development Program of China (863 Project), and National Natural Science Foundation of China, etc.

Research Interests:
The major goals are to select full-length antibodies and antibody fragments against important and emerging viruses by phage display, yeast display, and other high throughput screening technologies; develop novel C-based single domain antibodies (nanoantibodies) based on scaffolds derived from antibody constant CH2 domains in antibody Fc fragments; and improve biological activities of Fc fragments. We try to elucidate the basic questions (e.g., understand the mechanism of virus-host interactions) in virology, and solve several difficulties for improvement of yield of protein-related drugs during the research and development of therapeutic antibodies (e.g., improve the efficiency of correct folding in proteins).