Abstract
Foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) poses a persistent threat to the livestock sector, urging a need for safer and more effective vaccines. As traditional control approaches relying on inactivated virus vaccines face limitations, exploring subunit vaccine strategies such as those based on synthetic peptides represents an attractive alternative, compliant with DIVA vaccine requirements. We previously reported that dendrimer structures combining virus-specific B- and T-cell epitopes-referred to as B(2)T-conferred solid protection against type-O FMDV in swine. More recently, we designed a synthetic strategy with broad application prospects, assembling peptides into a modular dendrimer platform named B(2)T-TB(2), a dimeric version of the preceding construct, harboring up to six immunologically relevant epitopes. In this study, we demonstrate that a single low dose of this multiepitopic vaccine induces in swine a fast and robust neutralizing response covering a broad antigenic spectrum and confers full protection, portraying B(2)T-TB(2) as a promising FMDV emergency vaccine.