miRNAs target the flu

Researchers at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine have used microRNA to generate influenza strains that are attenuated in humans but not in chicken eggs.¹ The strategy could potentially lead to safe and effective live attenuated flu vaccines with high manufacturing yields.

Although live attenuated vaccines have multiple efficacy advantages over inactivated vaccines, the technology for attenuation hasn't changed in the past 40 years and relies on spontaneous mutagenesis under suboptimal conditionsto create a suitable strain. The Mount Sinai researchers were looking to rationalizeand speed up the process, and now they have shown that miRNA can be used to generate viruses with species-specific attenuation.¹...