Analysis of ChimeriVax Japanese Encephalitis Virus envelope for T-cell epitopes and comparison to circulating strain

Anne S De Groot1, William Martin, Leonard Moise

  • 1Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, United States. AnnieD@EpiVax.com

Vaccine
|October 19, 2007
PubMed

T-cell epitope variability is associated with viral immune escape and may influence the outcome of vaccination against the highly variable Japanese Encephalitis Virus (JEV). We computationally analyzed the ChimeriVax-JEV vaccine envelope sequence for T helper epitopes that are conserved in 12 circulating JEV strains and discovered 75% conservation among putative epitopes. Among non-identical epitopes, only minor amino acid changes that would not significantly affect HLA-binding were present. Therefore, in most cases, circulating strain epitopes could be restricted by the same HLA and are likely to stimulate a cross-reactive T-cell response. Based on this analysis, we predict no significant abrogation of ChimeriVax-JEV-conferred protection against circulating JEV strains.

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