Protein sequences containing antigenized antibodies for foot-and-mouth disease

Antibodies are proteins produced by the body!\s immune system in response to foreign elements (antigens) which invade the body. Antigenized antibodies are antibodies which are genetically engineered in their variable domain to express epitopes of different antigens. As such, antigenized antibodies can be used as an alternative approach to conventional or synthetic peptide vaccination. This new vaccine formulation is an antigenized antibody gene which elicits immunicity against foot-and-mouth disease virus. The new FMD Vaccine is created by grafting a genetically engineered viral peptide sequence onto swine immunoglobulin(IgM) molecules. When injected into the host, it will stimulate immunogenicity against the complimentary determining regions(CDR) of the FMD virus. It overcame the problem with conventional FMD vaccine using inactive virus, which are proven inefficient and expensive. The fact that the new FMD Vaccines does not contain a viral RNA eliminated potential safety problem with possible not completely inactivated virus in conventional vaccines that can therefore cause the disease to spread. Foot-and-Mouth Disease(FMD) is a highly contagious, severely debilitating disease which infects all cloven-hoofed animals. It is endemic in many developing countries in Asia, Africa, and parts of South America. To the swine growing business, FMD reduces livestock productivity, incurs high vaccination costs, and restricts the international trade of livestock and products. The economic loss of one pig farm in Hong Kong at the outbreak of FMD can reach HK$2,000,000