| Literature DB >> 10618412 |
T Arichi1, T Saito, M E Major, I M Belyakov, M Shirai, V H Engelhard, S M Feinstone, J A Berzofsky.
Abstract
DNA vaccines express antigens intracellularly and effectively induce cellular immune responses. Because only chimpanzees can be used to model human hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections, we developed a small-animal model using HLA-A2.1-transgenic mice to test induction of HLA-A2.1-restricted cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) and protection against recombinant vaccinia expressing HCV-core. A plasmid encoding the HCV-core antigen induced CD8(+) CTLs specific for three conserved endogenously expressed core peptides presented by human HLA-A2.1. When challenged, DNA-immunized mice showed a substantial (5-12 log(10)) reduction in vaccinia virus titer compared with mock-immunized controls. This protection, lasting at least 14 mo, was shown to be mediated by CD8(+) cells. Thus, a DNA vaccine expressing HCV-core is a potential candidate for a prophylactic vaccine for HLA-A2.1(+) humans.Entities:
Mesh：
Substances：
Year: 2000 PMID： 10618412 PMCID： PMC26657 DOI： 10.1073/pnas.97.1.297
Source DB: PubMed Journal: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A ISSN： 0027-8424 Impact factor: 11.205