Plenary Speaker: The Glycan Shield of Enveloped Viruses: from HIV to SARS-CoV-2

The emergence of the betacoronavirus, SARS-CoV-2 that causes COVID-19, represents a significant threat to global human health. Vaccine development is focused on the principal target of the humoral immune response, the spike (S) glycoprotein, that mediates cell entry and membrane fusion. SARS-CoV-2 S gene encodes 22 N-linked glycan sequons per protomer, which likely play a role in immune evasion and occluding immunogenic protein epitopes. In this talk, I will discuss the site-specific mass spectrometric analysis of the glycan structures of recombinant SARS-CoV-2 S immunogens and that of an infectious virus. This analysis enables mapping of the glycan-processing states across the recombinant and native viral spikes and has implications for serological testing and vaccine design. Comparison of the glycosylation of SARS-CoV-2 with other viruses, such as HIV, also reveal fundamental differences in the utilization of glycosylation in viral pathobiology.