Vaccine Development – Epitope Identification with NeoScreen

Immunitrack’s unique NeoScreen is a leading platform technology that facilitates accurate and high-throughput studies of MHC interactions with epitopes of interest. The platform contributes to increasing the safety and efficacy of new vaccines by yielding reliable immunogenicity data that can be used for early assessment of epitopes during vaccine development.

Better Vaccines with CD4 and CD8-Stimulating Epitopes

When a pathogen, e.g., bacteria, virus or parasite, infects human cells, epitopes from any of that pathogen’s proteins can theoretically be bound and presented by MHC I receptors on host cell surfaces, leading to stimulation of CD4 and CD8 T cells to provoke antibody-mediated and cellular immune responses.

At Immunitrack, we believe that the key to developing powerful vaccines is to combine epitopes that stimulate an antibody response with epitopes that stimulate a cellular response. However, finding out which epitopes lead to highly effective immune responses and are thus worth pursuing for vaccine development is a challenge.

Vaccine Links

• Vaccine development: Introduction ▸
• Vaccine development: Project overview ▸
• Vaccine development: Case studies ▸
• Vaccine development: COVID-19 ▸
• Spike CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T Cell Epitope Kits▸
• COVID-19 CD8⁺ T Cell Tetramer Panel ▸

How Can Immunitrack’s NeoScreen Help?

The majority of T cell epitopes used in vaccine development are identified through in silico prediction platforms that typically incorporate multiple aspects of MHC class-specific affinity. Although widely used, affinity measurements alone may yield false positive predictions, because for any epitope to be truly immunogenic, it must be able to bind a compatible MHC molecule and remain bound for long enough to be presented to and recognised by T cells to elicit an immune response (1-5).

Our NeoScreen immunogenicity prediction platform combines affinity and stability assays to eliminate the false positives that may arise when conducting affinity assays alone. Identifying such false positives early during vaccine development enables optimisation to include immunogenic epitopes, ultimately leading to vaccines with greater efficacy.

References

1. Harndahl, M. et al. Peptide-MHC class I stability is a better predictor than peptide affinity of CTL immunogenicity. Eur J Immunol. 2012,42(6):1405-16.
2. Dylan T et al. High-Throughput Stability Screening of Neoantigen/HLA Complexes Improves Immunogenicity Predictions. Cancer Immunol Res. 2019 Jan;7(1):50-61
3. Lazarski CA, Chaves FA, Jenks SA, Wu S, Richards KA, Weaver JM, Sant AJ. The kinetic stability of MHC class II:peptide complexes is a key parameter that dictates immunodominance. bImmunity. 2005; 23:29–40.
4. Lazarski CA, Chaves FA, Sant AJ. The impact of DM on MHC class II-restricted antigen presentation can be altered by manipulation of MHC-peptide kinetic stability. J Exp Med. 2006; 203:1319–1328.
5. Weaver JM, Chaves FA, Sant AJ. Abortive activation of CD4 T cell responses during competitive priming in vivo. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2009; 106:8647–8652.