Table 2.

Peptides derived from the second-generation conserved-region candidate HIV-1 vaccine binding HLA-E.

		Cell-Surface Stabilization Indexb
Name	Sequencea	E*01:01	E*01:03 ± SD	E*01:03/VL9c	E*01:03/PM9c
	TALSEGATPQDLNTM	0.25	0.373 ± 0.055	2.600	0.617
C022	SALSEGATPQDLNMM	0.14	0.382 ± 0.027	2.600	0.617
C025	PQDLNTMLNTVGGHQ	0.32	0.431 ± 0.038	2.281	0.620
C026	PQDLNMMLNIVGGHQ	0.25	0.429 ± 0.037	2.281	0.620
	GHQAAMQMLKDTINE	0.27	0.455 ± 0.033	2.281	0.620
C032	GHQAAMQMLKETINE	0.16	0.480 ± 0.057	2.281	0.620
C037	INEEAAEWDRVHPVH	0.30	0.419 ± 0.031	2.281	0.620
C038	INEEAAEWDRLHPVH	0.20	0.389 ± 0.039	2.281	0.620
	IVRMYSPVSILDIRQ	0.21	0.476 ± 0.088	2.572	0.658
	IVRMYSPTSILDIKQ	0.03	0.518 ± 0.033	2.572	0.658
C182	TEEKIKALTEICKEM	0.33	0.463 ± 0.085	2.572	0.658
C226	YFSVPLDESFRKYTA	−0.15	0.669 ± 0.010	2.369	0.733
C227	YFSVPLDKDFRKYTA	0.21	0.618 ± 0.042	2.369	0.733
C352	QMAVFIHNFKRKGGI	0.26	0.641 ± 0.051	2.369	0.733
C353	QMAVLIHNFKRRGGI	0.17	0.632 ± 0.065	2.369	0.733
C376	VYYRDSRDPIWKGPA	0.22	0.366 ± 0.044	2.572	0.658
C377	VYYRDSRDPLWKGPA	0.17	0.353 ± 0.039	2.572	0.658

^aThe immunogens of second generation of the conserved-region candidate T-cell HIV-1 vaccine were designed as a bivalent mosaic [63], which maximizes the perfect match of 9-mer potential T-cell epitopes on the vaccine with the globally circulating HIV-1 variants [53]. Thus, for each selected conserved region of the HIV-1 proteome, which was employed in the vaccine immunogens, two versions of the amino acid sequences were computed, which differed in approximately 1 in 10 amino acids (bold underlined). Exceptionally, the two peptides were identical in both bi-valent mosaic immunogens (e.g. peptide C182).

^bThe cell-surface stabilization index on RMA-S cells transfected with either HLA-E*01:01 or HLA-E*01:03 together with human β₂-microglobulin is calculated as follows: Index = (Sample 37 °C – No peptide 37 °C) / (Sample 26 °C – No peptide 26 °C). The results for HLA-E*01:03 are shown as mean $\pm \hspace{0.17em}SD\hspace{0.17em}\left(n=3\right).$ See Fig. S2 for the gating strategy. Table shows peptides with stronger binding that the majority of the 401 screened peptides tested on LCL721.221 (HLA-E*01:01), the cell-surface stabilization indices of which were between 0 and 0.01.

^cOn each experimental day, VL9 (VMAPRTLVL) and PM9 peptides were included as positive controls.