Expression of MHC class I molecules together with antigenic peptides on filamentous phages

Abstract

The availability of combinatorial T cell epitope libraries made using a phage display system would be useful for identifying the antigens recognized by T cells of unknown specificity. To this end, we have investigated here whether single chain-MHC class I molecules (scMHC-I) could be expressed together with antigenic peptides on filamentous phages. The results show that filamentous phages can express scMHC-I. Moreover, the expressed scMHC-I was able to bind antigenic peptide. These data support the use of combinatorial scMHC/T cell epitope libraries for screening potential T cell antigens.