A new study on mice offers hope for a vaccine against coronavirus, according to the researchers behind it.
The latest research successfully protected mice against a lethal dose of MERS, a very close relative of the new coronavirus that causes covid-19.
Scientists suggest that the same delivery method could work against SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for ongoing covid-19 pandemic.
In the research, scientists used another virus that is harmless in humans, engineered so that it would produce the glycoprotein known to be involved in MERS infections. Mice inhaled the virus in one single dose.
When those same mice were exposed to a usually lethal dose of MERS, four weeks later, all of them survived. All of the mice that were given the vaccine died.
The research is published this week in mBio, a journal of the American Society of Microbiology.
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