4 RICE SEED CDNA CLONES BELONGING TO THE ALPHA-AMYLASE TRYPSIN-INHIBITOR GENE FAMILY ENCODE POTENTIAL RICE ALLERGENS

Four rice seed proteins encoded by cDNAs belonging to the alpha-amylas e/trypsin inhibitor gene family were overexpressed as TrpE-fusion prot eins in E. coli. The expressed rice proteins were detected by SDS-PAGE as major proteins in bacterial cell lysates. Western blot analyses sh owed that all the recombinant proteins were immunologically reactive t o rabbit polyclonal antibodies and to a mouse monoclonal antibody (25B 9) specific for a previously isolated rice allergen of 16 kDa. Some tr uncated proteins from deletion mutants of the cDNAs retained their rea ctivity to the specific antibodies. These results suggest that the cDN As encode potential rice allergens and that some epitopes of the recom binant proteins are still immunoreactive when they are expressed as th eir fragments.