COVID-19 T-Cell Atlas: HSE Researchers Develop a Comprehensive Web Portal

Laboratory for Research on Molecular Mechanisms of longevity, in collaboration with other departments of the Faculty of Biology and Biotechnology (HSE University), developed the COVID-19 T-cell atlas - a comprehensive web portal, which allows to analyze how SARS-CoV-2 mutations change the presentation of viral peptides.

The results of the research were published in Nucleic Acids Research journal.

Rapidly emerging SARS-CoV-2 mutations can affect T cell epitopes – which can help the virus evade CD8 or CD4 T cell responses. In this regard, HSE researchers decided to create a T-cell atlas of COVID-19, which allows analyzing how SARS-CoV-2 mutations change the presentation of viral peptides by HLA molecules. The data in the atlas are given for common variants of the virus and the most common HLA class I and class II alleles.

In this study, the binding affinity of HLA molecules and viral peptides was assessed using precise in silico methods. The results obtained emphasize the importance of taking into account the diversity of HLA alleles: mutational changes in the virus peptides strongly depend on HLA alleles. For example, the scientists found that the required number of peptides that bind strongly to HLA-B*07:02 in the Wuhan reference variant no longer bind strongly to the Indian (Delta) and British (Alpha) variants. The developers of the atlas hope that T-CoV can help researchers and clinicians predict the susceptibility of people with different HLA genotypes to infection with SARS-CoV-2 variants and/or predict its severity.