The use of fusion proteins to study HLA-B27-specific allorecognition

Potential antigenic regions of the various external domains of the HLA-B27 antigen were expressed as fusion proteins in bacterial hosts and analyzed for their ability to induce humoral and cellular responses. Monoclonal antibodies directed against the proteins recognized monomorphic determinants of denatured HLA-antigens, but not B27-antigens expressed by intact lymphocytes. T-cell proliferation and IL-2 secretion were induced with a fusion protein representing regions of the first and second domains around amino acid residue 114. None of the fusion proteins stimulated cytotoxic T-lymphocytes (CTL) in an HLA-specific manner, although several included those amino acid sequences thought to be important for CTL recognition.