RESUMO
MOTIVATION: Identifying antigen epitopes is essential in medical applications, such as immunodiagnostic reagent discovery, vaccine design, and drug development. Computational approaches can complement low-throughput, time-consuming, and costly experimental determination of epitopes. Currently available prediction methods, however, have moderate success predicting epitopes, which limits their applicability. Epitope prediction is further complicated by the fact that multiple epitopes may be located on the same antigen and complete experimental data is often unavailable. RESULTS: Here, we introduce the antigen epitope prediction program ISPIPab that combines information from two feature-based methods and a docking-based method. We demonstrate that ISPIPab outperforms each of its individual classifiers as well as other state-of-the-art methods, including those designed specifically for epitope prediction. By combining the prediction algorithm with hierarchical clustering, we show that we can effectively capture epitopes that align with available experimental data while also revealing additional novel targets for future experimental investigations.
Assuntos
Algoritmos , Antígenos , Biologia Computacional , Epitopos , Epitopos/química , Epitopos/imunologia , Biologia Computacional/métodos , Antígenos/imunologia , Antígenos/química , Mapeamento de Epitopos/métodos , SoftwareRESUMO
Kyasanur forest disease (KFD) is a known viral haemorrhagic fever in India, for the last 60 years. However, in recent years, the change in epidemiological profile of the disease has suggested that it is now time to consider KFD as an emerging tropical disease in India. The preference should be to educate not only the villagers where it is being reported or detected but also to public health experts, veterinarians, forest officials and medical professionals to pay attention while seeing a patient overlapping with endemic diseases such as Japanese encephalitis, West Nile, dengue, chikungunya, malaria and tuberculosis. Although the existence of KFD is known for a long time, updated understanding of its clinical profile in humans is still limited. This article describes in detail the clinical presentation of KFD reported till date. It also highlights geographical distribution of the disease, risk factors for virus transmission, biochemical/haematological findings and control measures. There is an urgent need for research on KFD, particularly for understanding biphasic nature of illness, development of cost-effective diagnostic tools, utility of non-invasive samples for diagnosis and development of new vaccines.
Assuntos
Doenças Endêmicas , Doença da Floresta de Kyasanur/epidemiologia , Doença da Floresta de Kyasanur/virologia , Febre de Chikungunya/epidemiologia , Febre de Chikungunya/virologia , Dengue/epidemiologia , Dengue/virologia , Surtos de Doenças , Vírus da Encefalite Transmitidos por Carrapatos/patogenicidade , Humanos , Índia/epidemiologia , Doença da Floresta de Kyasanur/terapia , Malária/epidemiologia , Malária/parasitologia , Tuberculose/epidemiologia , Tuberculose/microbiologiaRESUMO
BACKGROUND: We conducted a sero-survey among pregnant women attending antenatal clinics of six hospitals which also function as sentinel sites for CRS surveillance, to estimate the prevalence of IgG antibodies against rubella. METHODS: We systematically sampled 1800 pregnant women attending antenatal clinics and tested their sera for IgG antibodies against rubella. We classified sera as seropositive (titre ≥10â¯IU/ml), sero-negative (titre <8â¯IU/ml) or indeterminate (titre 8-9.9â¯IU/ml) per manufacturer's instructions. In a sub-sample, we estimated the titers of IgG antibodies against rubella. IgG titer of ≥10â¯IU/mL was considered protective. RESULTS: Of 1800 sera tested, 1502 (83.4%) were seropositive and 24 (1.3%) were indeterminate and 274 (15.2%) were sero-negative. Rubella sero-positivity did not differ by age group, educational status or place of residence. Three hundred and eighty three (87.8%) of the 436 sera had IgG concentrations ≥10â¯IU/mL. CONCLUSION: The results of the serosurvey indicate high levels of rubella sero-positivity in pregnant women. High sero-prevalence in the absence of routine childhood immunization indicates continued transmission of rubella virus in cities where sentinel sites are located.