The Chinese University of Hong Kong’s (CUHK) Faculty of Medicine has developed the world’s first algorithm to rapidly evaluate the effectiveness of vaccines used to combat SARS-CoV-2 variants. According to the article published in the journal of Nature Medicine, the algorithm delivers a 95 percent rate of accuracy when predicting a vaccine’s efficacy and can be used to determine which ingredients would offer more protection.
CUHK’s Faculty of Medicine staff introduced its new bioinformatic algorithm during a July 14 press conference held at the university’s Jockey Club School of Public Health and Primary Care.
In developing the algorithm, the researchers studied the relationship between the “Genetic Distance” (GD) of circulating viruses against the vaccine strain and vaccine effectiveness (VE) against symptomatic infection. This is referred to as the VE-GD framework, which enabled the researchers to examine the binding domain of the viral spike protein receptor, and quickly assess a vaccine’s protective abilities….