Biomedical and Biotechnology Research Journal · Published 2026-04-01 · DOI 10.4103/bbrj.bbrj_25_26
Background: The group specific antigen (Gag) polyprotein of human immunodeficiency virus-1 is an essential protein for the formation of virus particles and has emerged as a target for potential therapeutic interventions. Identification of viable linear B-Cell and cytotoxic T-Cell epitopes within intrinsically disordered regions within the Gag polyprotein can be achieved through immunoinformatics and related computational tools. The identified epitopes can be incorporated into a synthetic peptide vaccine construct designed in silico. Methods: Linear B-Cell and cytotoxic T-Cell epitopes were identified through B-Cell and cytotoxic T-Cell epitope prediction tools found in the Immune Epitope Database. These were assessed for antigenicity, allergenicity, toxicity, cross-reactivity, and sequence conservation in silico. Disorder analysis was conducted and cross-referenced with predicted epitopes. These were combined into a vaccine construct along with adjuvants and linkers and tested for potential immunogenicity. Results: A total of 9 B-Cell and 2 T-Cell epitopes were identified as viable candidates, with both T-Cell epitopes and 7 B-Cell epitopes found in disordered regions. Different portions of a vaccine construct containing these epitopes, RS09, pan HLA DR-binding epitope, and the appropriate linkers binds spontaneously with Toll-like receptor 4 and induced increases and maintenance in memory B-Cell and memory helper T-Cell populations, with corresponding increases of cytotoxic T-Cell populations as well as antibody and cytokine concentrations. Conclusions: A synthetic peptide vaccine construct from B-Cell and T-Cell epitopes found in disordered regions that induces immune responses in simulations was designed in silico. As such, this could warrant further investigations of the vaccine construct in vitro and in vivo.
Abstract from DOAJ. Public domain (CC0 1.0).
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