Facile Discovery of a Diverse Panel of Anti-Ebola Virus Antibodies by Immune Repertoire Mining

Sci Rep. 2015 Sep 10:5:13926. doi: 10.1038/srep13926.

Abstract

The ongoing evolution of Ebolaviruses poses significant challenges to the development of immunodiagnostics for detecting emergent viral variants. There is a critical need for the discovery of monoclonal antibodies with distinct affinities and specificities for different Ebolaviruses. We developed an efficient technology for the rapid discovery of a plethora of antigen-specific monoclonal antibodies from immunized animals by mining the VH:VL paired antibody repertoire encoded by highly expanded B cells in the draining popliteal lymph node (PLN). This approach requires neither screening nor selection for antigen-binding. Specifically we show that mouse immunization with Ebola VLPs gives rise to a highly polarized antibody repertoire in CD138(+) antibody-secreting cells within the PLN. All highly expanded antibody clones (7/7 distinct clones/animal) were expressed recombinantly, and shown to recognize the VLPs used for immunization. Using this approach we obtained diverse panels of antibodies including: (i) antibodies with high affinity towards GP; (ii) antibodies which bound Ebola VLP Kissidougou-C15, the strain circulating in the recent West African outbreak; (iii) non-GP binding antibodies that recognize wild type Sudan or Bundibugyo viruses that have 39% and 37% sequence divergence from Ebola virus, respectively and (iv) antibodies to the Reston virus GP for which no antibodies have been reported.

Publication types

  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Antibodies, Viral / genetics
  • Antibodies, Viral / immunology*
  • Antibody Formation / genetics
  • Antibody Formation / immunology
  • B-Lymphocytes / immunology
  • B-Lymphocytes / metabolism
  • Cross Reactions
  • Disease Models, Animal
  • Ebolavirus / immunology*
  • Epitopes / genetics
  • Epitopes / immunology
  • Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola / genetics
  • Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola / immunology*
  • Humans
  • Immunization
  • Immunoglobulin G / genetics
  • Immunoglobulin G / immunology
  • Immunoglobulin Heavy Chains / genetics
  • Immunoglobulin Heavy Chains / immunology
  • Immunoglobulin Light Chains / genetics
  • Immunoglobulin Light Chains / immunology
  • Immunoglobulin Variable Region / genetics
  • Immunoglobulin Variable Region / immunology
  • Lymph Nodes / immunology
  • Mice
  • Phenotype
  • Protein Binding / immunology

Substances

  • Antibodies, Viral
  • Epitopes
  • Immunoglobulin G
  • Immunoglobulin Heavy Chains
  • Immunoglobulin Light Chains
  • Immunoglobulin Variable Region