Post-panning computer-aided analysis of phagotope collections selected with neurocysticercosis patient polyclonal antibodies: Separation of disease-relevant and irrelevant peptide sequences

The homology of peptide sequences selected from a 7mer phage display librar y with antibodies elicited by the multicelled parasite Taenia solium in cer ebrospinal fluid acid serum of neurocysticercosis (NCC) patients and by ant ibodies of uninfected control patients with similar neurological complicati ons of other ethiology (non-NCC) were analyzed using a PILEUP-Tudos sequenc e alignments program. The analysis generated dendrograms bearing two types of sequence clusters, those containing (1) only NCC patients-derived peptid es and (2) both NCC- and control non-NCC - patient derivatives. By using EL ISA, peptides that were selected by the antibodies were identified predomin antly in the NCC-derived clusters. In repeated analysis in which sequences were added or removed, the first type of clusters maintained their structur e, while the second type of clusters were split into many separate homology units dispersed throughout the guide tree. These results are interpreted a s the ability of the analysis to segregate NCC-specific peptide sequences f rom other sequences. Altogether, this study demonstrates the high potential of the PILEUP-Tudos computer program to analyze phagotope collections reco vered through biopanning with polyclonal antibodies elicited in patients by complex and as yet unknown multiple pathogenic antigens and to separate al l phagotopes that are disease-relevant on the basis of the sequence homolog y.