1. Leishmania major: Protective capacity of DNA vaccine using amastin fused to HSV-1 VP22 and EGFP in BALB/c mice model
- Author
-
Bolhassani, Azam, Gholami, Elham, Zahedifard, Farnaz, Moradin, Neda, Parsi, Parto, Doustdari, Fatemeh, Seyed, Negar, Papadopoulou, Barbara, and Rafati, Sima
- Subjects
- *
CUTANEOUS leishmaniasis , *DNA vaccines , *HERPES simplex virus , *LABORATORY mice , *GREEN fluorescent protein , *LEISHMANIA , *VIRAL proteins - Abstract
Abstract: An intercellular spreading strategy using herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) VP22 protein is employed to enhance DNA vaccine potency of Leishmania major amastin antigen in BALB/c mice model. We evaluated the immunogenicity and protective efficacy of plasmid DNA vaccines encoding amastin-enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) and VP22-amastin-EGFP. Optimal cell-mediated immune responses were observed in BALB/c mice immunized with VP22-amastin-EGFP as assessed by cytokine gene expression analysis using real time RT-PCR. Vaccination with the VP22-amastin-EGFP fusion construct elicited significantly higher IFN-gamma response upon antigen stimulation of splenocytes from immunized mice compared to amastin as a sole antigen. Mice immunized by VP22-amastin-EGFP showed partial protection following infectious challenge with L. major, as measured by parasite load in spleens. These results suggest that the development of DNA vaccines encoding VP22 fused to a target Leishmania antigen would be a promising strategy to improve immunogenicity and DNA vaccine potency. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]
- Published
- 2011
- Full Text
- View/download PDF