IMMUNOINFORMATICS-DRIVEN MULTI-EPITOPE VACCINE APPROACHES FOR DENGUE VIRUS

Approximately, there have been over 1.4 crore cases with more than 10,000 deaths reported globally in 2024 alone, making Dengue virus (DENV) a major global health threat. DENV is structurally 11kb long, consisting of a capsid, a pre-membrane, and an envelope protein. This virus exists as four different serotypes ranging from DENV-1 to 4. Antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE) is a phenomenon that stands as a formidable challenge in managing dengue infection that escalates mild dengue fever into more severe forms, such as dengue hemorrhagic fever and dengue shock syndrome. This happens due to an increased risk of severity as a result of secondary infections with a different serotype, thus making the vaccine development process against this virus more complicated. Current vaccine candidates such as Dengvaxia and TV003/TV005 face limitations in safety and effectuality due to the risk of secondary infections. My review emphasizes the major significance and potential of multi-epitope vaccines against all DENV serotypes, and how it is primarily designed using immunoinformatics by targeting both T-cell and B-cell epitopes, which has a huge potential to provide cross-protective immunity. Immunoinformatics offers an efficient and cost-effective approach that has already demonstrated successful results in developing mRNA vaccines against SARS-CoV-2. It reinforces the potential of multi-epitope vaccines against DENV, which can also overcome the limitations of traditional vaccine development, protecting any future genetic variations and therefore offering a promising solution globally.