Immunogenicity of a novel tetravalent dengue envelope protein domain III-based antigen in mice

Authors

  • Hossein Fahimi Department of Genetics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
  • Majid Sadeghizadeh Department of Genetics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
  • Zuhair M. Hassan Department of Immunology, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
  • Heidi Auerswald Department of Virology, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Hamburg, Germany
  • Michael Schreiber Department of Virology, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Hamburg, Germany

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.17179/excli2018-1664

Keywords:

dengue, serotypes, domain III, vaccine, tetravalent

Abstract

Dengue virus is a mosquito-borne pathogen that causes dengue diseases. All four serotypes of dengue virus are infectious for humans. Therefore, an efficacious dengue vaccine should be tetravalent to provide protection against all types of virus. The goal of this study was to design a new tetravalent recombinant protein from envelope protein of dengue viruses to induce virus-neutralizing antibodies against all four serotypes in mice. A chimeric protein was designed from domain III of envelope protein of all serotypes of dengue virus. Four domain III fragments were linked together by alpha helix making linkers. The final sequence of the designed protein was analyzed in silico and the coding gene sequence was deduced by reverse translation. After cloning and expression of the recombinant protein (ED3-tetravalent protein), identity of the purified protein was confirmed using a pan-dengue specific monoclonal antibody in Western blotting. Then, the immunogenicity of the purified protein was studied in mice using antibody titration. The efficacy of induced antibodies in neutralization of the virus was studies by FRNT method. Furthermore, the induction of cellular immunity was studied by measurement of cytokines using ELISA method and measurement of lymphocyte proliferation using MTT assay. The ED3-tetravalent protein was able to enhance neutralizing immunogenic response against all four dengue serotypes; in similar way to that of tetravalent formulation of four individual domain III-based polypeptides. It is suggested that the ED3-tetravalent fusion protein can induce broadly neutralizing antibody responses against all four serotypes of dengue virus in mice.

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Published

2018-11-05

How to Cite

Fahimi, H., Sadeghizadeh, M., Hassan, Z. M., Auerswald, H., & Schreiber, M. (2018). Immunogenicity of a novel tetravalent dengue envelope protein domain III-based antigen in mice. EXCLI Journal, 17, 1054–1068. https://doi.org/10.17179/excli2018-1664

Issue

Vol. 17 (2018)

Section

Original articles

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