Abstract
Allergens are characterized by their ability to be bound by gE. The Swiss-Prot protein database currently lists a partial or complete amino acid sequence of in excess of about 350 allergens. It is not clear how allergens participate in the process of allergic sensitization, the generation of specific T-helper type 2 (Th2) lymphocytes, which play a crucial role in stimulating B lymphocytes to produce allergen-specific IgE.
T-helper (Th) cells play a key role in the regulation of immune responses. The recognition of antigen by T cells is complex and it can trigger qualitatively differential signaling. Therefore, it is conceivable that epitopes or antigenic determinants recognized by Th cells may influence the quality of immune response. The aim of this chapter is to describe the way in which T-cell epitopes can be identified (mapped). This is particularly important because knowledge of the precise T-cell epitopes of allergens can give important information on the pathogenesis of allergy and can help to develop better preparations for the diagnostics and/or immunotherapy of allergy.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsSpringer Nature is developing a new tool to find and evaluate Protocols. Learn more
References
Reed, C. E. and Kita, H. (2004) The role of protease activation of inflammation in allergic respiratory diseases. J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. 114, 997–1008.
Virtanen, T. and Mäntyjarvi, R. A. (2005) Important mammalian respiratory allergens are lipocalins. In Lipocalins (Åkerström, B., Borregaard, N., Flower, D., and Salier, J.-P., eds), Landes Bioscience, Georgetown, http://www.eurekah.com/abstract.php?chapid=2559&bookid=190&catid=15.
Holt, P. G. and Thomas, W. R. (2005) Sensitization to airborne environmental allergens: unresolved issues. Nat. Immunol. 6, 957–960.
Scheiner O. and Kraft, D. (1995) Basic and practical aspects of recombinant allergens. Allergy 50, 384–391.
Dudler, T., Chen, W.-Q., Wang, S., Schneider, T., Annand, R. R., and Dempcy, R. O. (1992) High-level expression in Escherichia coli and rapid purification of enzymatically active honey bee venom phospholipase A2. Biochim. Biophys. Acta 1165, 201–210.
Schwartz, R. H. (1985) T-lymphocyte recognition of antigen in association with gene products of the major histocompatibility complex. Annu. Rev. Immunol. 3, 237–261.
Germain, R. N. (1993) Antigen processing and presentation. In Fundamental Immunology (Paul, W. E., ed.), 3rd Ed., Raven, New York, pp. 629–676.
Abbas, A. K., Murphy, K. M., and Sher, A. (1996) Functional diversity of helper T lymphocytes. Nature 383, 787–793.
Evavold, B. D. and Allen, P. M. (1991) Separation of IL-4 production from Th cell proliferation by an altered T cell receptor ligand. Science 252, 1308–1310.
Sloan-Lancaster, J. and Allen, P. M. (1996) Altered peptide ligand-induced partial T cell activation: molecular mechanisms and role in T cell biology. Annu. Rev. Immunol. 14, 1–27.
Virtanen, T., Zeiler, T., Rautiainen, J., and Mäntyjärvi, R. (1999) Allergy to lipocalins: a consequence of misguided T-cell recognition of self and nonself? Immunol. Today 20, 398–400.
Kinnunen, T., Buhot, C., Närvänen, A., et al. (2003) The immunodominant epitope of lipocalin allergen Bos d 2 is suboptimal for human T cells. Eur. J. Immunol. 33, 1717–1726.
Virtanen, T. and Mäntyjärvi, R. (2004) Mammalian allergens. In Allergens and Allergen Immunotherapy (Lockey, R. F., Bukantz, S. C., and Bousquet, J., eds), Marcel Dekker, Inc., New York, pp. 297–317.
Till, S. J., Francis, J. N., Nouri-Aria, K., and Durham, S. R. (2004) Mechanisms of immunotherapy. J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. 113, 1025–1034.
Ali, F. R. and Larche, M. (2005) Peptide-based immunotherapy: a novel strategy for allergic disease. Expert Rev Vaccines 4, 881–889.
Bungy, G. A., Rodda, S., Roitt, I., and Brostoff, J. (1994) Mapping of T cell epitopes of the major fraction of rye grass using peripheral blood mononuclear cells Mapping of Human T-Cell Epitopes of Allergens 55 from atopics and non-atopics. 2. Isoallergen clone 5A of Lolium perenne group I (Lol p I). Eur. J. Immunol. 24, 2098–2103.
Reece, J. C., McGregor, D. L., Geysen, H. M., and Rodda, S. J. (1994) Scanning for T helper epitopes with human PBMC using pools of short synthetic peptides. J. Immunol. Method. 172, 241–254.
Zeiler, T., Mäntyjärvi, R., Rautiainen, J., et al. (1999) T cell epitopes of a lipocalin allergen colocalize with the conserved regions of the molecule. J. Immunol. 162, 1415–1422.
Immonen, A., Farci, S., Taivainen, A., et al. (2005) T cell epitope-containing peptides of the major dog allergen Can f 1 as candidates for allergen immunotherapy. J. Immunol. 105, 3614–3620.
Novak, E. J., Liu, A. W., Gebe, J. A., et al. (2001) Tetramer-guided epitope mapping: rapid identification and characterization of immunodominant CD4+ T cell epitopes from complex antigens. J. Immunol. 166, 6665–6670.
de Lalla, C., Sturniolo, T., Abbruzzese, L., et al. (1999) Cutting edge: identification of novel T cell epitopes in Lol p5a by computational prediction. J. Immunol. 163, 1725–1729.
Taswell, C. (1984) Limiting dilution assays for the determination of immuno-competent cell frequencies. III. Validity tests for the single-hit Poisson model. J. Immunol. Methods 72, 29–40.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2008 Humana Press Inc., Totowa, NJ
About this protocol
Cite this protocol
Zeiler, T., Virtanen, T. (2008). Mapping of Human T-Cell Epitopes of Allergens. In: Jones, M.G., Lympany, P. (eds) Allergy Methods and Protocols. Methods in Molecular Medicine, vol 138. Humana Press. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-59745-366-0_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-59745-366-0_5
Publisher Name: Humana Press
Print ISBN: 978-0-89603-896-7
Online ISBN: 978-1-59745-366-0
eBook Packages: Springer Protocols