%0 Journal Article
%T Allergenic Characterization of New Mutant Forms of Pru p 3 as New Immunotherapy Vaccines
%A C. G¨®mez-Casado
%A M. Garrido-Arandia
%A P. Gamboa
%A N. Blanca-L¨®pez
%A G. Canto
%A J. Varela
%A J. Cuesta-Herranz
%A L. F. Pacios
%A A. D¨ªaz-Perales
%A L. Tordesillas
%J Journal of Immunology Research
%D 2013
%R 10.1155/2013/385615
%X Nowadays, treatment of food allergy only considered the avoidance of the specific food. However, the possibility of cross-reactivity makes this practice not very effective. Immunotherapy may exhibit as a good alternative to food allergy treatment. The use of hypoallergenic molecules with reduced IgE binding capacity but with ability to stimulate the immune system is a promising tool which could be developed for immunotherapy. In this study, three mutants of Pru p 3, the principal allergen of peach, were produced based on the described mimotope and T cell epitopes, by changing the specific residues to alanine, named as Pru p 3.01, Pru p 3.02, and Pru p 3.03. Pru p 3.01 showed very similar allergenic activity as the wild type by in vitro assays. However, Pru p 3.02 and Pru p 3.03 presented reduced IgE binding with respect to the native form, by in vitro, ex vivo, and in vivo assays. In addition, Pru p 3.03 had affected the IgG4 binding capacity and presented a random circular dichroism, which was reflected in the nonrecognition by specific antibodies anti-Pru p 3. Nevertheless, both Pru p 3.02 and Pru p 3.03 maintained the binding to IgG1 and their ability to activate T lymphocytes. Thus, Pru p 3.02 and Pru p 3.03 could be good candidates for potential immunotherapy in peach-allergic patients. 1. Introduction IgE-mediated allergy is a hypersensitivity disease suffering from more than 25% of the population in industrialized countries. Currently, specific immunotherapy is the only allergen-specific approach for its treatment and for preventing its progression to severe manifestations [1, 2]. The administration of increasing doses of allergen extracts to patients is the method most commonly applied. However, the use of crude extracts has several disadvantages. It could induce severe anaphylactic side reactions [3] or lead to sensitization towards new allergens present in the mixture [4, 5]. Different strategies have been designed to try to overcome these negative effects [6], as the use of allergen-derived B cell peptides [7, 8], allergen-derived T cell epitope containing peptides [9, 10] or vaccination with allergen-encoding DNA [11, 12]. In food allergy, immunotherapy is not commonly used due to the negative side effects, although several studies have been performed [13, 14]. The use of hypoallergenic mutants would be a good strategy to avoid the nondesired side effects of immunotherapy. Hypoallergenic mutants have been developed for several pollens and foods allergens [15¨C18], and their utility for immunotherapy has been studied [19, 20]. These mutants
%U http://www.hindawi.com/journals/jir/2013/385615/