Figure 6. Epitope precursor degradation rates of natural HLA-A*02- and HLA-B*27-restricted epitopes as well as of an artificial chimeric epitope.

The percentage of undigested 25-mer precursor peptide left following 1, 2, 4, and 6 hours of constitutive and immunoproteasomal digestion, respectively. The amino acid sequences of the examined 25-mer peptides are shown with imbedded optimal epitopes underlined and the amount of purified proteasomal solution is indicated. B27-in-A2 signifies the B27-NS5B₂₈₄₁ epitope surrounded by the A2-NS5B₂₅₉₄ flanking regions, while A2-in-A2 and B27-in-B27 show these epitopes in their natural sequence contexts. The grey line indicates 50% degradation of the precursor peptide. Data are representative of triplicate experiments.