Epistasis at the SARS-CoV-2 Receptor-Binding Domain Interface and the Propitiously Boring Implications for Vaccine Escape

Emergence of vaccine escape variants of SARS-CoV-2 is arguably the most pressing problem during the COVID-19 pandemic as vaccines are distributed worldwide. We employed a computational approach to assess the risk of antibody escape resulting from mutations in the receptor-binding domain of the spike protein of the wild-type SARS-CoV-2 virus as well as the Delta, Gamma, and Omicron variants.