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Outer membrane protein LipL21 as a potential candidate against Leptospira interrogans: An in silico prediction
1Amity Institute of Virology and Immunology, Amity University, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India.
Abstract:
Leptospirosis is one of the most widespread zoonotic diseases caused by Leptospira interrogans, characterized by mild febrile illness to severe multiorgan failure. The conventional vaccines against Leptospira have several drawbacks, including short-term immunity and serovar-based protection. The current study focuses on determining the most effective outer membrane protein (OMP) as a potential antigen using various computational approaches in providing protection against leptospirosis, as they are conserved within pathogenic serovars. Out of OmpL1, LipL21, LipL32, and LipL41, the VaxiJen analysis revealed LipL21 to be the most antigenic with a score of 0.7848. The antigenic epitopes of LipL21 were further analyzed using BCPred and MHCPred. It is conserved among all the pathogenic serovars while being absent in nonpathogenic. LipL21 had both B-cell and T-cell epitopes, suggesting that it is immunogenic. The VaxiJen score, localization of protein, Clustal Omega, and confirmational analysis of B-cell epitopes were studied for defining a better immunogenic and conserved OMP. This study holds importance as the surface proteins are a potential vaccine candidate for the development of new and effective vaccines in the prevention of leptospirosis hold. An ideal protein, which has its entire conserved immunogenic domain, would confer cross-protection against heterologous serovars. Thus, using bioinformatic approaches, we for the first time predict that LipL21 is a promising, effective vaccine candidate in providing protection against Leptospira.
Insights
Researchers identified LipL21 as a highly antigenic outer membrane protein for Leptospira interrogans. This conserved protein shows promise as a vaccine candidate for effective leptospirosis prevention.
Area of Science:
- Microbiology
- Immunology
- Bioinformatics
Background:
- Leptospirosis, caused by Leptospira interrogans, is a significant zoonotic disease with variable clinical presentations.
- Current vaccines offer limited duration of immunity and serovar-specific protection, necessitating novel approaches.
Purpose of the Study:
- To identify a conserved and immunogenic outer membrane protein (OMP) of Leptospira interrogans for potential vaccine development.
- To evaluate OMPs including OmpL1, LipL21, LipL32, and LipL41 using computational methods.
Main Methods:
- Computational analysis including VaxiJen, BCPred, and MHCPred were employed to assess antigenicity and epitope prediction.
- Protein conservation analysis using Clustal Omega and confirmational analysis of B-cell epitopes were performed.
Main Results:
- LipL21 demonstrated the highest antigenicity score (0.7848) via VaxiJen analysis.
- LipL21 possesses both B-cell and T-cell epitopes, indicating immunogenicity, and is conserved in pathogenic but absent in nonpathogenic Leptospira strains.
Conclusions:
- LipL21 is predicted as a promising vaccine candidate due to its high antigenicity, immunogenicity, and conservation across pathogenic Leptospira serovars.
- This study highlights the potential of LipL21 for developing broadly protective vaccines against leptospirosis.
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