{
  "abstract": "The extensive evolutionary diversity and continuous mutational adaptation of betacoronaviruses represent a major challenge to the development of broadly protective countermeasures. This study applied an evolution-informed Viroinformatics framework to systematically identify conserved and immune targets with predicted lower mutational vulnerability across betacoronaviruses. The workflow integrated comparative sequence conservation and phylogenetic analysis with immunoinformatics-based epitope screening, HLA population coverage, mutational escape profiling, structural modeling, molecular docking, and molecular dynamics simulations. Conserved cytotoxic T-lymphocyte and helper T-lymphocyte epitopes were prioritized based on immunogenicity, antigenicity, safety, HLA binding potential, evolutionary conservation, and predicted resistance to mutational escape. Combined MHC class I and II analysis predicted a theoretical global population coverage of 99.92%, which requires experimental validation. The resulting 409-amino-acid multiepitope construct was predicted to be antigenic, non-allergenic, and physiochemically stable. Structural validation showed that 99.7% of the residues were located within favored or additionally allowed regions. Molecular docking demonstrated favorable interaction of the vaccine construct with TLR7, while a 100 ns molecular dynamics simulation supported persistence of the predicted vaccine-receptor association. Overall, these findings provide a computational framework for prioritizing evolutionarily conserved immune targets and developing pre-emptive candidate epitopes showing predicted cross-betacoronavirus conservation within the analyzed dataset. Experimental studies evaluating HLA binding, cellular and humoral immunogenicity, recombinant expression, cross-reactivity, and in vivo protection are required to validate the predicted immunological potential and determine whether the proposed construct can provide broad protection against diverse betacoronaviruses.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [
    "Department of Zoology, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh 11495, Saudi Arabia.",
    "Fuli Institute of Food Science, College of Biosystems Engineering and Food Science, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China.",
    "Department of Clinical Laboratory Sciences, College of Applied Medical Sciences, Jouf University, Sakaka 72388, Saudi Arabia.",
    "Department of Biology, College of Science, Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University, P.O. Box 84428, Riyadh 11671, Saudi Arabia.",
    "Department of Biology, College of Science, University of Tabuk, Tabuk 71491, Saudi Arabia.",
    "Molecular Microbiology and Infectious Diseases Research Unit, University of Tabuk, Tabuk 71491, Saudi Arabia."
  ],
  "article_type": "research article",
  "arxiv": null,
  "author_total": 8,
  "authors": [
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Jamilah Alshammari"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Huda A Alqahtani",
      "orcid": "0009-0007-0766-6971"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Rasha Alonaizan",
      "orcid": "0009-0005-7312-309X"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        1
      ],
      "name": "Inam Ur Rahman",
      "orcid": "0009-0006-8724-2898"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        2
      ],
      "name": "Khaled Alzhrani"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        3
      ],
      "name": "Nawal Al-Hoshani"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        3
      ],
      "name": "Maha Abdullah Alwaili"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        4,
        5
      ],
      "name": "Tariq Aziz",
      "orcid": "0009-0006-9375-403X"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/f5ca1rv1st10q.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.3390/v18101171",
  "fulltext_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13709907",
  "id": "f5ca1rv1st10q",
  "issns": [
    "1999-4915"
  ],
  "landing_url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42944090",
  "language": "eng",
  "licence": "CC-BY",
  "licence_label": "CC BY",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "metadata_licence": null,
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "openalex",
      "1312|vaccines and immunoinformatics approaches"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7223132746",
  "pdf_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13709907?pdf=render",
  "pmcid": "PMC13709907",
  "pmid": "42944090",
  "published": "2026-10-21",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/f5ca1rv1st10q.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:22:12Z",
      "native_id": "MED:42944090",
      "source": "europepmc",
      "url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42944090"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "biochemistry",
      "origin": "openalex:1312|vaccines and immunoinformatics approaches",
      "subfield": "molecular-biology"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Evolution-Informed Viroinformatics Identifies Conserved Immune Targets with Predicted Lower Mutational Vulnerability Across Betacoronaviruses.",
  "title_text": "Evolution-Informed Viroinformatics Identifies Conserved Immune Targets with Predicted Lower Mutational Vulnerability Across Betacoronaviruses.",
  "type": "peer-reviewed",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:22:12Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/f5ca1rv1st10q",
  "venue": "Viruses",
  "versions": []
}