Designing arenaviral vaccines.

Several hemorrhagic fevers, including Lassa fever (LF; Lassa virus), Argentinian hemorrhagic fever (AHF; Junin virus), Bolivian hemorrhagic fever (BHF; Machupo virus) and Venezuelan hemorrhagic fever (VHF; Guanarito virus) are caused by arenaviruses. These diseases can be devastating, and often lethal. LCMV, the prototype of the Arenaviridae, can cause aseptic meningitis, and is a known teratogen. Despite the pathogenicity of the arenaviruses, to date only one vaccine (against AHF) has been evaluated in humans. In this chapter we shall review the design of arena viral vaccines. The rational design of a vaccine requires that we consider (a) the viruses themselves, (b) the route(s) by which they infect the unfortunate host, (c) the host immune response induced, (d) possible negative consequences of immunization, and (e) the vaccine approaches available. Some of these topics are discussed in detail in other chapters of this volume, and thus will be described quite briefly below.