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Brief Definitive Report |
Correspondence to: Richard A. Young, Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, 9 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142. Tel:617-258-5218 Fax:617-258-0376 E-mail:young{at}wi.mit.edu.
To gain insights into the mechanisms by which soluble heat shock protein (hsp) fusions can elicit CD8+ cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) against the fusion partner, mycobacterial (Mycobacterium tuberculosis) hsp70 was dissected to ascertain whether a particular hsp domain is necessary, and knockout mice were used to determine whether the fusion protein's immunogenicity is dependent on CD4+ T lymphocytes. We found that the ability to elicit CD8+ CTLs depends on a discrete 200amino acid protein domain, indicating that the fusion protein's immunogenicity for CD8+ T cells does not require coupled chaperone function or peptide binding. Further, we found that ovalbumin (OVA).hsp70 fusion protein elicited anti-OVA CD8+ CTLs about equally well in CD4 knockout and wild-type C57BL/6 mice, and also when the hsp70 was of murine (self) origin. The ability of hsp70 fusion proteins to elicit CD4-independent CTL responses suggests that hsp70 fusion proteins may be useful for immunological prophylaxis and therapy against disease in CD4+ T celldeficient individuals.
Key Words: CD8+, CD4+, domain, knockout, vaccine
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