Discovery of novel <i>Salmonella</i> I-A^b epitopes.

<p>(A) C57BL/6 mice were immunized with a mixture of 4 groups of 11 peptides from <a href="http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.ppat.1002499#ppat-1002499-t001" target="_blank">Table 1</a> at 5 µg/peptide in CFA. Eight days later, draining lymph nodes were isolated and purified CD4 T cells restimulated with individual peptides (<a href="http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.ppat.1002499#ppat-1002499-t001" target="_blank">Table 1</a>) in the presence of irradiated splenocytes. IFN-γ production was measured 24–36 hours later by ELISPOT. (B) 129Sv mice were orally infected with virulent 5x10⁷<i>Salmonella</i> (SL1344) and spleens harvested 11 weeks later. Purified CD4 T cells were restimulated with peptides from <a href="http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.ppat.1002499#ppat-1002499-t002" target="_blank">Table 2</a> for 24–36 h in the presence of irradiated splenocytes and IFN-γ production measured by ELISPOT. ConA and no peptide wells constitute the positive and negative controls respectively. Each plate is representative of 2–3 individual experiments.