Dengue and Zika virus multi-epitope antigen expression in insect cells

Dengue virus and Zika virus are arthropod-borne flaviviruses that cause millions of infections worldwide. The co-circulation of both viruses makes serological diagnosis difficult as they share high amino acid similarities in viral proteins. Antigens are one of the key reagents in the differential di...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Molecular biology reports Vol. 47; no. 10; pp. 7333 - 7340
Main Authors:	Lopes-Luz, Leonardo, Junqueira, Isabela Cinquini, da Silveira, Lucimeire Antonelli, de Melo Pereira, Bruna Ribeiro, da Silva, Leonardo Assis, Ribeiro, Bergmann Morais, Nagata, Tatsuya
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	English
Published:	Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01-10-2020 Springer Nature B.V
Subjects:	Animal Anatomy Animal Biochemistry Animals Antigens Antigens, Viral - biosynthesis Antigens, Viral - genetics Baculoviridae - genetics Baculoviridae - metabolism Biomedical and Life Sciences Cell Line Dengue fever Dengue virus Dengue Virus - genetics Differential diagnosis E protein Epitopes Epitopes - biosynthesis Epitopes - genetics Flaviviridae Gene Expression Histology Immunodominance Immunoglobulin G Insect cells Life Sciences Morphology Moths Original Article Recombinant Fusion Proteins - biosynthesis Recombinant Fusion Proteins - genetics Serology Sucrose Viral Envelope Proteins - biosynthesis Viral Envelope Proteins - genetics Viruses Zika virus Zika Virus - genetics Antigens Insect cells Multi-epitope Zika virus Dengue virus
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Summary:	Dengue virus and Zika virus are arthropod-borne flaviviruses that cause millions of infections worldwide. The co-circulation of both viruses makes serological diagnosis difficult as they share high amino acid similarities in viral proteins. Antigens are one of the key reagents in the differential diagnosis of these viruses through the detection of IgG antibodies in serological assays during the convalescent-phase of infections. Here, we report the expression of Dengue virus (DENV) and Zika virus (ZIKV) antigens containing non-conserved and immunodominant amino acid sequences using the baculovirus expression vector system in insect cells. We designed DENV and ZIKV antigens based on the domain III of the E protein (EDIII) after analyzing previously reported epitopes and by multiple alignment of the most important flaviviruses. The ZIKV and DENV multi-epitope genes were designed as tandem repeats or impaired repeats separated by tetra- or hexa-glycine linkers. The biochemical analyses revealed adequate expression of the antigens. Then, the obtained multi-epitope antigens were semi-purified in a sucrose gradient and tested using patients’ sera collected during the convalescent-phase that were previously diagnosed positive for anti-DENV and -ZIKV IgG antibodies. The optimal serum dilution was 1:200, and the mean absorbance values in the preliminary tests show that multi-epitope antigens have been recognized by human sera. The production of both antigens using the multi-epitope strategy in the eukaryotic system and based on the EDIII regions provide a proof of concept for the use of antigens in the differentiation between DENV and ZIKV.
Bibliography:	ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23
ISSN:	0301-4851 1573-4978
DOI:	10.1007/s11033-020-05772-1