Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting Autoimmunity
Understanding etiology of autoimmune diseases has been a great challenge for designing drugs and vaccines. The pathophysiology of many autoimmune diseases may be attributed to molecular mimicry provoked by microbes. Molecular mimicry hypothesizes that a sequence homology between foreign and self-pep...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2017-10-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Microbiology |
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| Online Access: | http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01938/full |
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| author | Susanta Pahari Susanta Pahari Deepyan Chatterjee Shikha Negi Jagdeep Kaur Balvinder Singh Javed N. Agrewala |
| author_facet | Susanta Pahari Susanta Pahari Deepyan Chatterjee Shikha Negi Jagdeep Kaur Balvinder Singh Javed N. Agrewala |
| author_sort | Susanta Pahari |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Understanding etiology of autoimmune diseases has been a great challenge for designing drugs and vaccines. The pathophysiology of many autoimmune diseases may be attributed to molecular mimicry provoked by microbes. Molecular mimicry hypothesizes that a sequence homology between foreign and self-peptides leads to cross-activation of autoreactive T cells. Different microbial proteins are implicated in various autoimmune diseases, including multiple sclerosis, human type 1 diabetes, primary biliary cirrhosis and rheumatoid arthritis. It may be imperative to identify the microbial epitopes that initiate the activation of autoreactive T cells. Consequently, in the present study, we employed immunoinformatics tools to delineate homologous antigenic regions between microbes and human proteins at not only the sequence level but at the structural level too. Interestingly, many cross-reactive MHC class II binding epitopes were detected from an array of microbes. Further, these peptides possess a potential to skew immune response toward Th1-like patterns. The present study divulges many microbial target proteins, their putative MHC-binding epitopes, and predicted structures to establish the fact that both sequence and structure are two important aspects for understanding the relationship between molecular mimicry and autoimmune diseases. Such findings may enable us in designing potential immunotherapies to tolerize autoreactive T cells. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-21T15:02:33Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-82bab89c1504414f9f27569f64f22fc0 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1664-302X |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-21T15:02:33Z |
| publishDate | 2017-10-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Microbiology |
| spelling | doaj.art-82bab89c1504414f9f27569f64f22fc02022-12-21T18:59:33ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Microbiology1664-302X2017-10-01810.3389/fmicb.2017.01938282324Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting AutoimmunitySusanta Pahari0Susanta Pahari1Deepyan Chatterjee2Shikha Negi3Jagdeep Kaur4Balvinder Singh5Javed N. Agrewala6Immunology Laboratory, CSIR-Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, IndiaDepartment of Biotechnology, Panjab University, Chandigarh, IndiaImmunology Laboratory, CSIR-Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, IndiaImmunology Laboratory, CSIR-Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, IndiaDepartment of Biotechnology, Panjab University, Chandigarh, IndiaImmunology Laboratory, CSIR-Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, IndiaImmunology Laboratory, CSIR-Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, IndiaUnderstanding etiology of autoimmune diseases has been a great challenge for designing drugs and vaccines. The pathophysiology of many autoimmune diseases may be attributed to molecular mimicry provoked by microbes. Molecular mimicry hypothesizes that a sequence homology between foreign and self-peptides leads to cross-activation of autoreactive T cells. Different microbial proteins are implicated in various autoimmune diseases, including multiple sclerosis, human type 1 diabetes, primary biliary cirrhosis and rheumatoid arthritis. It may be imperative to identify the microbial epitopes that initiate the activation of autoreactive T cells. Consequently, in the present study, we employed immunoinformatics tools to delineate homologous antigenic regions between microbes and human proteins at not only the sequence level but at the structural level too. Interestingly, many cross-reactive MHC class II binding epitopes were detected from an array of microbes. Further, these peptides possess a potential to skew immune response toward Th1-like patterns. The present study divulges many microbial target proteins, their putative MHC-binding epitopes, and predicted structures to establish the fact that both sequence and structure are two important aspects for understanding the relationship between molecular mimicry and autoimmune diseases. Such findings may enable us in designing potential immunotherapies to tolerize autoreactive T cells.http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01938/fullmolecular mimicrymicrobesautoimmunityautoantigensimmunoinformaticsHLA binders |
| spellingShingle | Susanta Pahari Susanta Pahari Deepyan Chatterjee Shikha Negi Jagdeep Kaur Balvinder Singh Javed N. Agrewala Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting Autoimmunity Frontiers in Microbiology molecular mimicry microbes autoimmunity autoantigens immunoinformatics HLA binders |
| title | Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting Autoimmunity |
| title_full | Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting Autoimmunity |
| title_fullStr | Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting Autoimmunity |
| title_full_unstemmed | Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting Autoimmunity |
| title_short | Morbid Sequences Suggest Molecular Mimicry between Microbial Peptides and Self-Antigens: A Possibility of Inciting Autoimmunity |
| title_sort | morbid sequences suggest molecular mimicry between microbial peptides and self antigens a possibility of inciting autoimmunity |
| topic | molecular mimicry microbes autoimmunity autoantigens immunoinformatics HLA binders |
| url | http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01938/full |
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