The broadly neutralizing anti-HIV antibody 4E10 recognizes an epitope very close to the virus membrane on the glycoprotein gp41. It was previously shown that epitope recognition improves in a membrane context and that 4E10 binds directly, albeit weakly, to lipids. Furthermore, a crystal structure of Fab 4E10 complexed to an epitope peptide revealed that the centrally placed, protruding H3 loop ...

The HLA class II-associated invariant chain (Ii)-derived peptide (CLIP) occupies the peptide binding groove during assembly in the endoplasmic reticulum, travels with HLA class II to endosomal compartments, and is subsequently released to allow binding of antigenic peptides. We investigated whether the exchange of CLIP with a known T helper epitope at the DNA level would lead to efficient loadi...

BACKGROUND There is increasing concern about the speed with which health care providers can administer prophylaxis and treatment in an influenza pandemic. Generally, it takes several months to manufacture an influenza vaccine by propagation of the virus in chicken eggs or cultured cells. Newer, faster protocols for the production of vaccines that induce broad-spectrum immunity are therefore hig...

The NH2-terminal amino acid sequence of type 12 M protein was determined by automated Edman degradation of a 38-kilodalton polypeptide fragment purified from a limited pepsin digest of intact type 12 streptococci. The sequence of the first 13 amino acid residues of the polypeptide confirmed that predicted by the nucleotide sequence of the mature type 12 M protein. A chemically synthesized pepti...

OBJECTIVE Weak major histocompatibility complex (MHC) binding of self-peptides has been proposed as a mechanism that may contribute to autoimmunity by allowing for escape of autoreactive T-cells from the thymus. We examined the relationship between the MHC-binding characteristics of a beta-cell antigen epitope and T-cell autoreactivity in a model of autoimmune diabetes. RESEARCH DESIGN AND ME...

Diagnostic peptides previously isolated from phage-displayed libraries by affinity selection with serum antibodies from patients with Lyme disease were found to give reproducible serum reactivity patterns when tested in two different enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay formats. In addition, the hypothetical possibility that peptides selected by this type of "epitope discovery" technique might ide...

Recently, we observed that CTL specific for the wild-type (wt) sequence p53(264-272) peptide could only be expanded ex vivo from PBMC of a subset of the HLA-A2.1(+) normal donors or cancer patients tested. Surprisingly, the tumors of the responsive patients expressed normal levels of wt p53 and could be considered unlikely to present this epitope. In contrast, tumors of nonresponsive patients a...

Infectious bursal disease (IBD), a highly contagious and devastating disease in young chicken, is causedby infectious bursal disease virus (IBDV). To improve the immunogenicity of recombinant IBDV subunitvaccine, an attempt was made to find a new way to prepare IBD vaccine containing glycosylated mVP2antigen. Firstly, IBDV mVP2 gene (with a nucleic acid sequence encoding B cell epitope of IBDV(...

Hypoallergenic formulas containing hydrolyzed protein are intended for use by infants to prevent cow’s milk allergy. The degree of hydrolysis epitopic areas determines the residual allergenicity whey hydrolysates (WPHs). However, only amino-acid-based infant (IFs) considered entirely nonallergenic. aim this study was investigate four commercially available WPHs with different (H1–H4) potential ...

A mass spectrometric method is described for the rapid mapping of linear epitopes in proteins that are bound by monoclonal antibodies. The method consists of three steps. In the first step, an antigen protein is digested by a proteolytic enzyme to produce an appropriate set of peptide fragments. In the second step, peptide fragments containing the linear epitope are selected and separated from ...