Figure 3.

Enhanced efficacy of anti–DEC-p24 plus anti-CD40/poly IC relative to DNA and nontargeted protein vaccines. (A) C57BL/6 mice were injected s.c. with maturation stimulus and the proteins indicated above each panel. IFN-γ secretion was evaluated after 18 d in the spleen by intracellular cytokine staining as the percentage of IFN-γ CD4⁺ cells among CD3⁺ lymphocytes in response to HIV gag p24 peptide pool 4. Data are one of two to four similar experiments. (B) BALB/c mice were injected with 2 μg anti–DEC-p24 s.c. plus maturation stimulus, one or two doses of 50 μg DNA encoding HIV gag p24 protein i.m., or PBS. IFN-γ secretion in response to HIV gag p24 peptide pool 3 was evaluated as in A. Data shown are one of two to four similar experiments. (C) BALB/c mice were immunized i.p. with 5 μg anti–DEC-p24 or control Ig-p24 antibodies plus maturation stimulus, two doses of 50 μg DNA encoding HIV gag p24 protein i.m., or PBS. IFN-γ secretion was evaluated as in A, but the response to HIV gag p24 peptide pool 2 (containing a dominant peptide presented on MHC class I) and p24 pool 3 (containing a peptide presented on MHC class II) are shown for T cells directly stained for CD8 expression. Data shown are from one of two similar experiments.