Novel multi-epitope vaccine against bovine brucellosis: approach from immunoinformatics to expression

Abstract

Brucellosis is a zoonotic caused by the Brucella which is a well-known infectious disease agent in domestic animals and if transmitted, it can cause infection in humans. Because brucellosis is contagious, its control depends on the eradication of the animal disease in farms. There are two vaccines based on the killed and/or weakened bacteria against B. melitensis and B. abortus, but no recombinant vaccine is available for preventing the disease. The present study was designed to develop a multi-epitope vaccine against of B. melitensis and B. abortus using virB10, Omp31 and Omp16 antigens by the prediction of T lymphocytes, T cell cytotoxicity and IFN-γ epitopes. 50S L7/L12 Ribosomal protein from Mycobacterium tuberculosis was used as a bovine TLR4 and TLR9 agonist. GPGPG, AAY and KK linkers were used as a linker. Brucella construct was well-integrated in the pET-32a Shuttle vector with BamHI and HindIII restriction enzymes. The final construct contained 769 amino acids, that it was soluble protein of about ∼82 kDa after expression in the Escherichia coli SHuffle host. Modeled protein analysis based on the tertiary structure validation, molecular docking studies, molecular dynamics simulations results like RMSD, Gyration and RMSF as well as MM/PBSA analysis showed that this protein has a stable construct and is capable being in interaction with bovine TLR4 and TLR9. Analysis of the data obtained suggests that the proposed vaccine can induce the immune response by stimulating T- and B-cells, and may be used for prevention and remedial purposes, against B. melitensis and B. abortus.

Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma

Keywords:

• Peptide vaccine
• immunoinformatics
• molecular dynamics simulations
• Brucella melitensis
• Brucella abortus

Authors’ contributions

Conceptualization, S.R and Y.M; methodology, S.R, Y.M and Sh.Y; formal analysis, S.R, Y.M and Sh.Y; resources, S.R and and Sh.Y; data curation, S.R and Y.M; writing—original draft preparation, S.R, Y.M and Sh.Y; writing—review and editing, S.R and Y.M; project administration, Y.M; funding acquisition, S.R, Y.M and Sh.Y. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Availability of data and materials

The authors state that all data and materials are available.

Ethical approval and consent to participate

All authors agree on the Ethical Approval and Consent to participate.

Consent for publication

All authors have consent for publication

Additional information

Funding

We would like to thank “Department of Animal Science, Faculty of Agriculture, Ilam University” for helping us in this study with Grant Number of 04_IRILU_Ag_00001521.