Structure, Immunogenicity, and Protectivity Relationship for the 1585 Malarial Peptide and Its Substitution Analogues

Abstract

Rational design of a malaria vaccine may result from the structure–immunogenicity relationship of analogues of peptide 1585, a protein sequence located at the N-terminal end of the P. falciparum 42-kDa merozoite surface protein-1. Altering a few amino acids in peptide 1585 (left) induces immunogenicity and protectivity, and changes the 3D structure, as shown for one of the analogues synthesized (right).