Selection of the peptide for antibody development.

<p><b>Fig. 2.A.</b> Schematic representation of the LGp/78 kDa glycoprotein (shaded bottom bar), Gn (gray top bar) and NSm (black striped bar) proteins. Gray full circles on stems represent the methionines in position 1 - start of the LGp/Gc polyprotein, and in position 39 - start of the NSm/Gn/Gc polyprotein. Forks indicate the two cleavage sites 153/154 and 690/691 in the M polyprotein. With translation starting at the methionine in position 39, cleavage at this sites leads to generation of the NSm, the Gn and the Gc proteins. With translation starting at the methionine in position 1, the cleavage occurs only at the 690/691 <u>aa</u> resulting in the LGp and Gc proteins. Clover leaves indicate the glycosylation sites (<u>aa</u> 88 and 438). Based on Gerrard and Nichol <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0087385#pone.0087385-Gerrard1" target="_blank">[4]</a>. Black solid bar represents the truncated recombinant recLGp (<u>aa</u> 1–121). Small thick fork indicates the peptide region unique to LGp against which the rabbit polyclonal (1109 and 1108) and the mouse monoclonal (SW9-22E) antibodies were raised. <b>Fig. 2.B.</b> Amino acid sequence of the recLGp including coding region of the expression vector at the N-terminus. Bold, capital <b>M</b> indicates starting methionine (V - in the expression plasmid, 1 - for LGp/Gc, 39 B for NSm/Gn/Gc);string of capital H stands for the His tag; underlined sequence from S to E in capital bold letters indicates sequence of the peptide used for antibody development. Italicized bold sequence <b><i>dglnNit</i></b> represents a potential prokaryotic N- glycosylation signal, and the eukaryotic N- glycosylation signal <b><i>Nit</i></b> (capital N in the 88 <u>aa</u> position). <b>Fig. 2.C.</b> Reprint of the EvoQuest predicted antigenicity of the SSTREETCTGDSTNPE peptide (the potential linear epitopes are encircled).