title: Identification of sequence similarities between Mycobacterium leprae and the myelin proteolipid protein by computational analysis.
abstract: This study was undertaken under the assumption that antigenic mimicry plays a role in the pathogenesis of neuropathy in leprosy, a unique feature among mycobacterial diseases. The SWISS-PROT protein sequence databank was scanned using a computer programme based on an identity matrix algorithm, to identify common amino acid regions between human myelin and mycobacterial proteins. The highlighted motifs were back-tested against a database of MHC-binding peptides (MHCPEP). Of the 28 common sequences between mycobacterial and human myelin proteins, only two were found to yield some matches with MHC-presenting peptides. Both motifs were from M.leprae. The myelin proteolipid protein was the human protein containing the identified similarities. We believe that this theoretical approach can provide a way to predict potentially "mimetic" motifs by search for antigenic regions in protein sequence databases without screening a large number of synthetic peptides.
authors.affiliation: Centro di Riferimento Nazionale per il Morbo di Hansen, Universita degli Studi di Genova, Italy.
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Fiallo
authors.forename: P P
authors.initials: PP
authors.lastname: Cardo
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Nunzi
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000737:chemistry*; D016208:Databases, Factual; D006801:Humans; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009166:Mycobacterium leprae / Q000737:chemistry*; D018991:Myelin Proteolipid Protein / Q000737:chemistry*; D020539:Sequence Analysis, Protein / Q000379:methods; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D012984:Software
chemical_list: D001426:Bacterial Proteins; D018991:Myelin Proteolipid Protein