Journal of Isfahan Medical School

Journal of Isfahan Medical School

Identification of a Common Epitope for Insulin in 2 Different Servers

Document Type : 6th congress of endocrinology & metabolism

Authors
Sima Olfati 1
Hamed Esmaeil Lashgarian 2
Masumeh Jalalvand 3
Maryam Zand 4
Amirmasoud Jalalvand 1
Leila Abkhooie 3
1 Department of Medical Biotechnology, School of Medicine, Lorestan University of Medical Sciences, Khorramabad, Iran
2 Associate Professor, Department of Medical Genetics and Biotechnology, Faculty of Medicine, Lorestan University of Medical Sciences, Khorramabad, Iran
3 Assistant Professor, Department of Medical Biotechnology, Faculty of Medicine, Lorestan University of Medical Sciences, Khorramabad, Iran
4 Department of medical biotechnology, Zanjan University of medical sciences, Zanjan, Iran
10.48305/jims.v43.i827.0978
Abstract
Background: The most important point about the pathogenesis of idiopathic autoimmune diabetes is related to the presence of major autoantigens. One of these important autoantigens that has been identified as targets of humoral autoimmunity in type 1 diabetes is insulin. Insulin autoantibodies are often the first autoantibodies to be detected in individuals with type 1 diabetes. The identification of unique insulin epitopes that can be recognized by T cells could help in the development of vaccines aimed at preventing the destruction of pancreatic beta cells in diabetes.
Methods: The objective of the present investigation was to ascertain the most effective epitopes for the designing of a vaccine aimed at insulin, a significant autoantigen associated with type 1 diabetes mellitus. The UniProt database provided the amino acid sequence of insulin, which was used for epitope identification from the IEDB server. In the process of epitope identification, we employed the prevalent human alleles DRB1*01:01, DRB3*01:01, DRB4*01:01, and DRB5*01:01, each of which comprises a length of 15 base pairs.
Findings: A common insulin epitope was identified using two IEDB servers: the IEDB MHC-II binding prediction tool (http://tools.iedb.org/mhcii/) and TEPITOOL (http://tools.iedb.org/tepitool/). The consensus epitope sequence was ERGFFYTPKTRREAE.
Conclusion: Since the development of vaccine design for high-prevalence diseases such as diabetes holds promise for the treatment and prevention of these diseases, in this study we decided to identify common epitopes associated with insulin, which is a key component in vaccine design.

Highlights

Amirmasoud Jalalvand: Google Scholar, PubMed

Keywords
Insulin
Type 1 diabetes
Vaccine

Subjects

  1. Wegmann DR, Norbury‐Glaseru M, Danielf D. Insulin‐specific T cells are a predominant component of islet infiltrates in pre‐diabetic NOD mice. Eur J Immunol 1994; 24(8): 1853-7.
  2. Lieberman SM, Evans AM, Han B, Takaki T, Vinnitskaya Y, Caldwell JA, et al. Identification of the β cell antigen targeted by a prevalent population of pathogenic CD8+ T cells in autoimmune diabetes. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2003; 100(14): 8384-8.
  3. Brezar V, Carel J-C, Boitard C, Mallone R. Beyond the hormone: insulin as an autoimmune target in type 1 diabetes. Endocr Rev 2011; 32(5): 623-69.
  4. Padoa CJ, Crowther NJ, Thomas J, Hall T, Bekris LM, Torn C, et al. Epitope analysis of insulin autoantibodies using recombinant Fab. Clin Exp Immunol 2005; 140(3): 564-71.
Journal of Isfahan Medical School
Volume 43, Issue 827
3rd Week, October: 6th International and 8th Iranian Congress of Endocrinology & Metabolism Updates
September and October 2025
Pages 978-979

  • Receive Date 05 June 2025
  • Accept Date 10 June 2025