ANALYSIS OF MURINE ANTIBODY-RESPONSES TO BACULOVIRUS-EXPRESSED HUMAN-IMMUNODEFICIENCY-VIRUS TYPE-1 ENVELOPE GLYCOPROTEINS

An analysis of the humoral immunogenicity of a candidate AIDS vaccine (VaxSyn) in a murine model system is presented. Sera taken from a pane l of mice immunized with the immunogen were analysed for their ability to bind a panel of gp120-representing peptides and limited reactivity to known sites of immunological interest was observed. Monoclonal ant ibodies (MAbs) were characterized as binding to a more restricted vari ety of regions on gp 120 including C1, V2, V4 and the C terminus. A te trazolium-based cytocidicity assay was used and shown to be an effecti ve and objective method for the screening of human immunodeficiency vi rus (HIV)-neutralizing activity in large numbers of samples. None of t he MAbs characterized in this study neutralize HIV-1 reference strains . The significance of these findings in view of previous publications is discussed.