T-Cell Epitope Vaccine Prediction Analysis Targeting Phosphoprotein (P) Rabies Virus Based on the Presence of HLA-I Alleles A, B, and C Loci Throughout Southeast Asia: An Immunoinformatics Study

Abstract

T cell immunity, like responses of CD4+and CD8+ T-cell, plays an important role to fight against viral infections and pathological harm. Several previous studies have shown the results that rabies virus (RABV) protein can act as an ideal receptor for rabies neuroseptic vaccine by inducing a response of T-cell. In this research, we evaluated possible vaccine epitopes based on the Rabies virus sequence and human lymphocyte antigen (HLA) distribution. First, this study used the rabies virus protein P sequence obtained from the NCBI database. Next, we predicted rabies CTL protein epitopes based on the frequency of HLA-I distribution allele locus A, B, and C in Southeast Asia region (> 1%) using Immune Epitope Database and Analysis Resource (iedb.org). Our results predict the presence of 12 epitopes of the protein P RABV. A cluster analysis of epitopes shows that seven P-protein clusters cover 97.47% of the Southeast Asian population. After a conservative epitope analysis, 8 epitopes of protein P showed protection in 11 different types of isolated Rabies virus. Finally, 4 epitopes (SQTVEEIISY119-128; RSSGIFLYNF218-227, ASGPPALEW178-186, IISYVTVNF125-133) were used to vaccinate 97.47% of people in Southeast Asia. Our results suggest that both single and combined CTL epitopes which were predicted in this study can be used as a more effective alternative vaccine against rabies virus’ infections and development