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Serological analysis of C‐terminal region of α antigen from Mycobacterium avium‐intracellulare complex and Mycobacterium tuberculosis
Author(s) -
KITAURA HIDEKI,
OHARA NAOYA,
NAITO MARIKO,
KOBAYASHI KAZUHIDE,
YAMADA TAKESHI
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
apmis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.909
H-Index - 88
eISSN - 1600-0463
pISSN - 0903-4641
DOI - 10.1111/j.1699-0463.1998.tb00236.x
Subject(s) - mycobacterium tuberculosis , mycobacterium , microbiology and biotechnology , antigen , serology , tuberculosis , virology , biology , medicine , immunology , antibody , pathology
The α antigen, which is a 30 kDa protein secreted by mycobacterial species, is an immunodominant antigen. The C‐terminal regions of α antigens are highly divergent, though there are regions where the amino acid sequence of α antigen is conserved. We investigated whether the C‐terminal regions of the Mycobacterium avium α antigen, M. intracellulare α antigen and M. tuberculosis α antigen contain sequence‐specific B‐cell epitopes. The C‐terminal regions of M. avium α antigen and M. intracellular α antigen reacted to anti‐ M. avium α antigen but not to anti‐ M. tuberculosis α antigen derived from rabbits. Thus, M. avium and M. intracellulare have an antigenic determinant in common with rabbit. The C‐terminal region of M. tuberculosis α antigen did not react to anti‐ M. avium α antigen or anti‐ M. tuberculosis α antigen. An enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay revealed that only the C‐terminal region of M. avium α antigen reacted to the sera of two of six patients with M. avium ‐intracellulare (MAC) but not to the sera of patients with M. tuberculosis. In contrast, the C‐terminal regions of M. intracellulare α antigen and M. tuberculosis α antigen were not recognized by the sera from patients with MAC or M. tuberculosis. This region of M. avium α antigen can produce a sequence‐specific B‐cell epitope in humans.