Structural and immunological reactivity of the principal neutralizing determinant V3 of glycoprotein gp120 of HIV-1.

Abstract

The variable domain V3 in the outer glycoprotein gp120 of HIV-1 is a highly important region with respect to immune response during the course of viral infection. Neutralizing antibodies are produced against this domain: in addition, it has been shown to be a functionally active epitope for T helper and cytotoxic T cells. The high degree of amino acid variability in individual HIV-isolates, however, limits the use of the V3-domain in approaches to vaccine development. In order to characterize the residues important for antibody interaction and binding to MHC class I proteins, we constructed a consensus sequence of the V3-domain with broad reactivity [1] and used synthetic peptides derived from this consensus sequence with individual residues altered to alanine. These peptides were used as antigens in ELISA tests to define the amino acids which are important for binding to human and rabbit/anti-peptide immunoglobulins. In addition, we used these alanine-derived peptides in interaction studies with human HLA-A2.1 and mouse H-2Dd by testing their capacity to stabilize the respective MHC class I protein complexes on the surface of mutant cell lines T2 and RMA-S transfected with Dd gene. The experimental tests allowed us to define individual residues involved in antibody and MHC-protein interaction, respectively. In a further approach, we used those results to design interaction models with HLA-A2.1 and H-2Dd. Therefore, a structural model for H-2Dd was built that exhibits an overall similar conformation to the parental crystal structure of HLA-A2.1. The resulting interaction models show V3-peptide bound in an extended beta-conformation with a bulge in its centre for both H-2Dd and HLA-A2.1 complexes. The N- and C-termini of V3 peptide reside in conserved pockets within both MHC-proteins. Anchoring residues could be determined that are crucial for the binding of the respective MHC class I haplotype. The cross-reactivity of V3-peptide in enhancing the expression of two different MHC class I molecules (H-2Dd and HLA-A2.1) is shown to be based on similar peptide binding that induces an almost identical peptide conformation.