Inactivation of thrombomodulin by ionizing radiation in a cell-free system: possible implications for radiation responses in vascular endothelium.

Normal tissue radiation injury is associated with loss of vascular thromboresistance, notably because of deficient levels of endothelial thrombomodulin (TM). TM is located on the luminal surface of most endothelial cells and has critical anticoagulant and anti-inflammatory functions. Chemical oxidation of a specific methionine residue (Met388) at the thrombin-binding site in TM reduces its main functional activity, i.

Multiple antigenic mimotopes of HIV carbohydrate antigens: relating structure and antigenicity.

Carbohydrate mimetic peptides are designable, and they can carry T-cell epitopes and circumvent tolerance. A mimic-based human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) vaccine can be a viable alternative to carbohydrate-based antigens if the diversity of epitopes found on gp120 can be recapitulated. To improve existing mimics, an attempt was made to study the structural correlates of the observed polyspecificity of carbohydrate mimetic peptides based on the Y(P/R)Y motif in more detail.

Targeting carbohydrate antigens in HIV vaccine development.

Peptide mimotopes provide a strategy to augment human immunodeficiency virus 1 (HIV-1) specific carbohydrate reactive immune responses. Their antigenic and immunological properties will depend on the optimization of motif clustering and multimerization. We observe that structural variants of the same mimetic motif, linear versus cyclic, can be used to tune the properties of the antibodies elicited.