TY - JOUR A1 - Connor, Daniel Oliver A1 - Danckert, Lena A1 - Hoppe, Sebastian A1 - Bier, Frank Fabian A1 - von Nickisch-Rosenegk, Markus T1 - Epitope determination of immunogenic proteins of Neisseria gonorrhoeae JF - PLoS one N2 - Neisseria gonorrhoeae is the causative organism of gonorrhoea, a sexually transmitted disease that globally accounts for an estimated 80 to 100 million new infections per year. Increasing resistances to all common antibiotics used for N. gonorrhoeae treatment pose the risk of an untreatable disease. Further knowledge of ways of infection and host immune response are needed to understand the pathogen-host interaction and to discover new treatment alternatives against this disease. Therefore, detailed information about immunogenic proteins and their properties like epitope sites could advance further research in this area. In this work, we investigated immunogenic proteins of N. gonorrhoeae for linear epitopes by microarrays. Dominant linear epitopes were identified for eleven of the nineteen investigated proteins with three polyclonal rabbit antibodies from different immunisations. Identified linear epitopes were further examined for non-specific binding with antibodies to Escherichia coli and the closely related pathogen Neisseria meningitidis. On top of that, amino acids crucial for the antibody epitope binding were detected by microarray based alanine scans. Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0180962 SN - 1932-6203 VL - 12 PB - PLoS CY - San Fransisco ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Connor, Daniel Oliver A1 - Zantow, Jonas A1 - Hust, Michael A1 - Bier, Frank Fabian A1 - von Nickisch-Rosenegk, Markus T1 - Identification of Novel Immunogenic Proteins of Neisseria gonorrhoeae by Phage Display JF - PLoS one N2 - Neisseria gonorrhoeae is one of the most prevalent sexually transmitted diseases worldwide with more than 100 million new infections per year. A lack of intense research over the last decades and increasing resistances to the recommended antibiotics call for a better understanding of gonococcal infection, fast diagnostics and therapeutic measures against N. gonorrhoeae. Therefore, the aim of this work was to identify novel immunogenic proteins as a first step to advance those unresolved problems. For the identification of immunogenic proteins, pHORF oligopeptide phage display libraries of the entire N. gonorrhoeae genome were constructed. Several immunogenic oligopeptides were identified using polyclonal rabbit antibodies against N. gonorrhoeae. Corresponding full-length proteins of the identified oligopeptides were expressed and their immunogenic character was verified by ELISA. The immunogenic character of six proteins was identified for the first time. Additional 13 proteins were verified as immunogenic proteins in N. gonorrhoeae. Y1 - 2016 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0148986 SN - 1932-6203 VL - 11 PB - PLoS CY - San Fransisco ER - TY - THES A1 - Connor, Daniel Oliver T1 - Identifikation und Charakterisierung neuer immunogener Proteine und anschließende Generierung rekombinanter Antikörper mittels Phage Display T1 - Identification and characterisation of novel immunogenic proteins and subsequent generation of recombinant antibodies by phage display N2 - Seit der Einführung von Antibiotika in die medizinische Behandlung von bakteriellen Infektionskrankheiten existiert ein Wettlauf zwischen der Evolution von Bakterienresistenzen und der Entwicklung wirksamer Antibiotika. Während bis in die 80er Jahre verstärkt an neuen Antibiotika geforscht wurde, gewinnen multiresistente Keime heute zunehmend die Oberhand. Um einzelne Pathogene erfolgreich nachzuweisen und zu bekämpfen, ist ein grundlegendes Wissen über den Erreger unumgänglich. Bakterielle Proteine, die bei einer Infektion vorrangig vom Immunsystem prozessiert und präsentiert werden, könnten für die Entwicklung von Impfstoffen oder gezielten Therapeutika nützlich sein. Auch für die Diagnostik wären diese immundominanten Proteine interessant. Allerdings herrscht ein Mangel an Wissen über spezifische Antigene vieler pathogener Bakterien, die eine eindeutige Diagnostik eines einzelnen Erregers erlauben würden. Daher wurden in dieser Arbeit vier verschiedene Humanpathogene mittels Phage Display untersucht: Neisseria gonorrhoeae, Neisseria meningitidis, Borrelia burgdorferi und Clostridium difficile. Hierfür wurden aus der genomischen DNA der vier Erreger Bibliotheken konstruiert und durch wiederholte Selektion und Amplifikation, dem sogenannten Panning, immunogene Proteine isoliert. Für alle Erreger bis auf C. difficile wurden immunogene Proteine aus den jeweiligen Bibliotheken isoliert. Die identifizierten Proteine von N. meningitidis und B. burgdorferi waren größtenteils bekannt, konnten aber in dieser Arbeit durch Phage Display verifiziert werden. Für N. gonorrhoeae wurden 21 potentiell immunogene Oligopeptide isoliert, von denen sechs Proteine als neue zuvor unbeschriebene Proteine mit immunogenem Charakter identifiziert wurden. Von den Phagen-präsentierten Oligopeptide der 21 immunogenen Proteine wurden Epitopmappings mit verschiedenen polyklonalen Antikörpern durchgeführt, um immunogene Bereiche näher zu identifizieren und zu charakterisieren. Bei zehn Proteinen wurden lineare Epitope eindeutig mit drei polyklonalen Antikörpern identifiziert, von fünf weiteren Proteinen waren Epitope mit mindestens einem Antikörper detektierbar. Für eine weitere Charakterisierung der ermittelten Epitope wurden Alaninscans durchgeführt, die eine detaillierte Auskunft über kritische Aminosäuren für die Bindung des Antikörpers an das Epitop geben. Ausgehend von dem neu identifizierten Protein mit immunogenem Charakter NGO1634 wurden 26 weitere Proteine aufgrund ihrer funktionellen Ähnlichkeit ausgewählt und mithilfe bioinformatischer Analysen auf ihre Eignung zur Entwicklung einer diagnostischen Anwendung analysiert. Durch Ausschluss der meisten Proteine aufgrund ihrer Lokalisation, Membrantopologie oder unspezifischen Proteinsequenz wurden scFv-Antikörper gegen acht Proteine mittels Phage Display generiert und anschließend als scFv-Fc-Fusionsantikörper produziert und charakterisiert. Die hier identifizierten Proteine und linearen Epitope könnten einen Ansatzpunkt für die Entwicklung einer diagnostischen oder therapeutischen Anwendung bieten. Lineare Epitopsequenzen werden häufig für die Impfstoffentwicklung eingesetzt, sodass vor allem die in dieser Arbeit bestimmten Epitope von Membranproteinen interessante Kandidaten für weitere Untersuchungen in diese Richtung sind. Durch weitere Untersuchungen könnten möglicherweise unbekannte Virulenzfaktoren entdeckt werden, deren Inhibierung einen entscheidenden Einfluss auf Infektionen haben könnten. N2 - Since the advent of antibiotics into the field of medical therapy of bacterial infections, there has been a battle of effective antibiotics and the everlasting evolution of bacterial resistances. Until the 1980s many antibiotics were developed after invention of the first applied antibiotic penicillin in 1946. Since then, antibiotic research has been largely neglected resulting in the evolution of numerous strains from different bacteria with multiple resistances to available antibiotics. Therefore, extensive knowledge of a pathogen is crucial to detect and fight a particular disease. Hence, proteins that are processed and presented preferentially by the immune system during an infection could be beneficial for the development of vaccines and targeted therapeutic agents. Furthermore, immunodominant proteins could be interesting for the development of a diagnostic tool. However, many potential antigen targets of most pathogenic bacteria are still unknown. On this account, four human pathogens were examined in this work utilising phage display: Neisseria gonorrhoeae, Neisseria meningitidis, Borrelia burgdorferi und Clostridium difficile. Phage libraries were constructed from genomic DNA of the four pathogens. These libraries were used to isolate immunogenic proteins by panning through repetitive rounds of selection and amplification. Immunogenic proteins were successfully isolated for all pathogens except C. difficile. The identified proteins from N. meningitidis and B. burgdorferi had mostly been described before. However, they were verified by phage display in this work. Twenty-one potentially immunogenic oligopeptides were isolated from the N. gonorrhoeae library. Six of those were identified as novel proteins with an immunogenic character and validated also as full length proteins. Epitope mappings were conducted for all of the 21 phage presented oligopeptides with different polyclonal antibodies to identify and characterise the immunogenic regions. Linear epitopes were found unambiguously for ten proteins with the three applied antibodies. In addition, epitopes for five proteins were identified with at least one antibody. The determined epitopes were then further characterized by alanine scans to investigate the impact of each individual amino acid on the binding of the antibody to the antigen’s epitope. Based on the novel identified immunogenic protein NGO1634, 26 additional proteins were selected due to their functional resemblance. These proteins were analysed with bioinformatic tools and amongst others checked for their localisation, membrane topology and conservation of their protein sequence. Finally, scFv antibody fragments were isolated from a phage display library (HAL9/10) against eight proteins. The best antibodies were then produced as scFv-Fc fusion antibodies and their binding behaviour was further characterised. The identified proteins and linear epitopes could serve as a starting point for the development of diagnostic or therapeutic tools. Further studies could unveil unknown virulence factors. Inhibition of those virulence factors could possibly have a vital impact on countering infections. Furthermore, linear epitopes are commonly used for vaccine development. Novel epitopes of membrane proteins could be interesting candidates for further immunization studies. KW - Immunogene Proteine KW - Phage Display KW - Rekombinante Antikörper KW - Neisseria gonorrhoeae KW - Neisseria meningitidis KW - Clostridium difficile KW - Borrelia burgdorferi KW - Epitopmapping KW - Immunogenic Proteins KW - Recombinant Antibodies KW - Epitope mapping KW - Phage Display KW - Neisseria gonorrhoeae KW - Neisseria meningitidis KW - Clostridium difficile KW - Borrelia burgdorferi Y1 - 2016 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-104120 ER -