Artificial antigen-presenting cells engineered by recombinant vaccinia viruses expressing antigen, MHC class II, and costimulatory molecules elicit proliferation of CD4⁺ lymphocytes in vitro

Abstract

The current study was designed to test the ability of recombinant Vaccinia virus (rVV) encoding essential components of an artificial antigen-presenting cell to activate antigen-specific T cells in vitro. We have constructed a set of rVV encoding separately or in combination a CD4⁺ T cell-specific epitope (the 133–145 peptide of chicken conalbumin), the MHC class II molecule I-A^k, and costimulatory molecules (mB7-1 and mB7-2). Cultured cells infected with rVV encoding both the antigen and the presenting MHC, but not either one alone, could activate cloned CD4⁺ T cells specific for the virus-encoded epitope. Additional co-expression of mB7-1 and mB7-2 resulted in further enhancement of T cell response. Thus, our rVV vector expressing four different foreign gene products elicited the highest proliferation rates of antigen-specific cloned T cells.

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