The translocation motif of hepatitis B virus improves protein vaccination
Authors
- E. Bleifuss
- T. Kammertoens
- A. Hutloff
- D. Quarcoo
- M. Dorner
- P. Straub
- W. Uckert
- E. Hildt
Journal
- Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences
Citation
- Cell Mol Life Sci 63: 627-635
Abstract
Cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) have been shown to improve antigen loading of dendritic cell vaccines. Here we asked whether fusion of a CPP to a protein improves its immunogenicity when this fusion protein is directly applied as vaccine. We used the cell-penetrating translocation motif (TLM) derived from the hepatitis B virus, because no size limitation of cargos has been observed. Increased immunogenicity was observed when TLM was fused to ovalbumin (TLM-ova). TLM-ova was found to be superior to ova in inducing proliferation and cytotoxicity of ova-specific CD8+ T cells in vitro and in vivo. Using ovalbumin-expressing thymoma cells (EG7-ova), an improved anti-tumor immune response was observed for TLM-ova vaccination versus vaccination with ova. Moreover, TLM-ova vaccination induced a higher titer of anti-ovalbumin IgG2a antibodies compared to ova. These data demonstrate that CPP-protein vaccines can improve cellular as well as humoral immune responses.