Fimbriae-assisted bacterial surface display of heterologous peptides

The display of peptide segments on the surface of bacteria offers many new and exciting applications in biotechnology and medical research. Fimbria-as sisted display of heterologous sequences is a paradigm for chimeric organel le display on bacteria. Fimbriac are particularly attractive candidates for epitope display for several reasons: (1) they are present in extremely hig h numbers at the cell surface, (2) they are strong immunogens, (3) they pos sess inherent adhesive properties, and (4) they can be easily purified. The majority of work dealing with fimbria-assisted peptide display has been fo cused on the development of recombinant vaccines. A number of different fim brial types have been used to display immune-relevant sectors of various fo reign proteins. Chimeric fimbrial vaccines can be used in the context of pu rified proteins, however the potential also exists to exploit this technolo gy for the development of live recombinant vaccines. Work has also bern per formed demonstrating the amenability of fimbriae towards the powerful techn ology of random peptide display. This review summarises the current state o f research in this field.