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Limited antigenic diversity of Plasmodium falciparum apical membrane antigen 1 supports the development of effective multi-allele vaccines

Terheggen, Ulrich and Drew, Damien R. and Hodder, Anthony N. and Cross, Nadia J. and Mugyenyi, Cleopatra K. and Barry, Alyssa E. and Anders, Robin F. and Dutta, Sheetij and Osier, Faith and Elliott, Salenna R. and Senn, Nicolas and Stanisic, Danielle I. and Marsh, Kevin and Siba, Peter M. and Mueller, Ivo and Richards, Jack S. and Beeson, James G.. (2014) Limited antigenic diversity of Plasmodium falciparum apical membrane antigen 1 supports the development of effective multi-allele vaccines. BMC medicine, Vol. 12 , 183.

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Abstract

BackgroundPolymorphism in antigens is a common mechanism for immune evasion used by many important pathogens, and presents major challenges in vaccine development. In malaria, many key immune targets and vaccine candidates show substantial polymorphism. However, knowledge on antigenic diversity of key antigens, the impact of polymorphism on potential vaccine escape, and how sequence polymorphism relates to antigenic differences is very limited, yet crucial for vaccine development. Plasmodium falciparum apical membrane antigen 1 (AMA1) is an important target of naturally-acquired antibodies in malaria immunity and a leading vaccine candidate. However, AMA1 has extensive allelic diversity with more than 60 polymorphic amino acid residues and more than 200 haplotypes in a single population. Therefore, AMA1 serves as an excellent model to assess antigenic diversity in malaria vaccine antigens and the feasibility of multi-allele vaccine approaches. While most previous research has focused on sequence diversity and antibody responses in laboratory animals, little has been done on the cross-reactivity of human antibodies.MethodsWe aimed to determine the extent of antigenic diversity of AMA1, defined by reactivity with human antibodies, and to aid the identification of specific alleles for potential inclusion in a multi-allele vaccine. We developed an approach using a multiple-antigen-competition enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) to examine cross-reactivity of naturally-acquired antibodies in Papua New Guinea and Kenya, and related this to differences in AMA1 sequence.ResultsWe found that adults had greater cross-reactivity of antibodies than children, although the patterns of cross-reactivity to alleles were the same. Patterns of antibody cross-reactivity were very similar between populations (Papua New Guinea and Kenya), and over time. Further, our results show that antigenic diversity of AMA1 alleles is surprisingly restricted, despite extensive sequence polymorphism. Our findings suggest that a combination of three different alleles, if selected appropriately, may be sufficient to cover the majority of antigenic diversity in polymorphic AMA1 antigens. Antigenic properties were not strongly related to existing haplotype groupings based on sequence analysis.ConclusionsAntigenic diversity of AMA1 is limited and a vaccine including a small number of alleles might be sufficient for coverage against naturally-circulating strains, supporting a multi-allele approach for developing polymorphic antigens as malaria vaccines.
Faculties and Departments:09 Associated Institutions > Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute (Swiss TPH)
09 Associated Institutions > Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute (Swiss TPH) > Department of Epidemiology and Public Health (EPH) > Health Interventions > Malaria Interventions (Lengeler)
UniBasel Contributors:Senn, Nicolas
Item Type:Article, refereed
Article Subtype:Research Article
Publisher:BioMed Central
ISSN:1741-7015
Note:Publication type according to Uni Basel Research Database: Journal article
Language:English
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Last Modified:31 Dec 2015 10:57
Deposited On:10 Apr 2015 09:12

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