Identificação de epítopos lineares para linfócito B em proteínas de leptospira interrogans sorovar copenhageni

Abstract

Bacteria of the genus Leptospira are spirochetes, morphologically and physiologically similar, but serologically and physiologically distinct. Pathogenic leptospires evade the immune response, and for the diversity of serovars, serovar-specific vaccines are necessary, which do not provide lasting immunity. This monograph sought to identify epitopes for B lymphocytes in five hypothetical membrane proteins from Leptospira interrogans serovar Copenhageni, by bioinformatics tools, in the hope of obtaining new antigens for diagnostics and vaccines. Protein analysis for domain identification, cellular localization and epitope prediction was performed on the platforms: ProtParam, Pfam, InterPro, Prosite, SMART, BcePred, IEDB, ABCpred, DeepTMHMM and SignlP 6.0. Using bioinformatics tools, it was possible to infer the location of the hypothetical proteins Lpra_01, Lpra_02, Lpra_03, Lpra_04 and Lpra_05 from Leptospira interrogans serovar Copenhageni, as well as identify the presence of domains and epitopes. Among the proteins analyzed, the programs identified the proteins Lpra_01 and Lpra_05 as membrane proteins, however, only in the first were identified epitopes that can be recognized by B lymphocytes, however, it is necessary to carry out laboratory tests to confirm these results.