Identification of dominant epitopes of synthetic immunocontraceptive vaccines that induce antibodies in dogs

The specificities of immunoglobulin G antibodies obtained from the sera of dogs inoculated with totally synthetic immunocontraceptive vaccine candidates based on luteinising hormone releasing hormone (LHRH: amino acid sequence HWSYGLRPG) were examined using peptides expressed in a phage display library. The three vaccine candidates each contained a different T helper-cell epitope chemically linked with the same LHRH amino acid sequence HWSYGLRPG and all of them elicited high antibody titres against the hormone. Delineation of epitopes recognised by sera from vaccinated dogs using a phage display library indicated that two of the three vaccine candidates induced antibody directed to the consensus sequence xHWSxxLxxx whereas the third vaccine candidate induced antibody against the consensus sequence xxxxxxxRPx. Two of the three vaccine candidates elicited antibodies against B cell epitopes present within the helper T-cell epitope component of the vaccine whereas the third vaccine did not. The occurrence of anti-T helper cell epitope antibodies appeared to have little or no effect on the generation of the anti-LHRH responses indicating that carrier-induced epitope suppression was not operating here. Our results also demonstrated that with animal sera of high quality, it is possible to delineate immunodominant epitopes recognised by polyclonal antibodies with high efficiency using phage display library. The approach has utility in the definition of immunodominant epitopes, which may “decoy” antibody responses away from other epitopes, which may be more useful in prophylaxis or therapy.