As the world has started to see the first rollouts of Covid-19 vaccines, I became curious about how they work; namely, the Pfizer-Biotech Vaccine.
The coronavirus has spikes embedded in its surface, made up of spike proteins. Pfizer & Biotech took advantage of these spike proteins and tried to replicate them. They did this by utilizing messenger RNA, or mRNA, to carry instructions on how to make their own spike proteins. The vaccine (containing this mRNA) bumps into our body cells and the mRNA is translated into three spike proteins, which then form a spike. These spikes protrude on the surface of the cell. This cell is now vaccinated! When the vaccinated cell dies, leftover spikes will be picked up by an antigen-presenting cell. An antigen-presenting cell is a type of immune cell. Antigen-presenting cells can present a spike protein to three different immune cells:
As the name suggests, it “presents” a spike protein fragment to a Helper T cell (this cell tells other immune cells to fight certain infections). Now, when a spike protein from the coronavirus is detected, the body knows to fight it. Additionally, helper T cells can also activate the immune cells known as B cells to create antibodies that target spike proteins. Killer T cells receive a spike fragment from the helper T cells. Its function is to seek out coronavirus-infected cells and kill them.
In summary, the vaccine does not act as a cure. Instead, it teaches our immune system to fight the coronavirus. It helps our bodies to produce antibodies (a certain type of protein that attaches to invading viruses and “marks” them for destruction).
For more detailed information, please see:
Corum, Jonathan, and Carl Zimmer. “How the Pfizer-BioNTech Vaccine Works.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 5 Dec. 2020, www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/health/pfizer-biontech-covid-19-vaccine.html.
I was always curious about how the Covid-19 vaccine works, and this post made me have a better understanding of how it works by showing a detailed description and examples. I hope this current issue gets better with the vaccine.