SAMURAI (Solid-phase Assisted Mutagenesis by Uracil Restriction for Accurate Integration) for antibody affinity maturation and paratope mapping.

Mutagenesis libraries are essential for combinatorial protein engineering. Despite improvements in gene synthesis and directed mutagenesis, current methodologies still have limitations regarding the synthesis of complete antibody single-chain variable fragment (scFv) genes and simultaneous diversification of all six CDRs. Here, we describe the generation of mutagenesis libraries for antibody affinity maturation using a cell-free solid-phase technique for annealing of single-strand mutagenic oligonucleotides. The procedure consists of PCR-based incorporation of uracil into a wild-type template, bead-based capture, elution of single-strand DNA, and in vitro uracil excision enzyme based degradation of the template DNA. Our approach enabled rapid (8 hours) mutagenesis and automated cloning of 50 position-specific alanine mutants for mapping of a scFv antibody paratope. We further exemplify our method by generating affinity maturation libraries with diversity introduced in critical, nonessential, or all CDR positions randomly. Assessment with Illumina deep sequencing showed less than 1% wild-type in two libraries and the ability to diversify all CDR positions simultaneously. Selections of the libraries with bacterial display and deep sequencing evaluation of the selection output showed that diversity introduced in non-essential positions allowed for a more effective enrichment of improved binders compared to the other two diversification strategies.

Epitope Mapping of Antibodies Using Bacterial Cell Surface Display of Gene Fragment Libraries.

The unique property of specific high affinity binding to more or less any target of interest has made antibodies tremendously useful in numerous applications. Hence, knowledge of the precise binding site (epitope) of antibodies on the target protein is one of the most important features for understanding its performance and determining its reliability in immunoassays. Here, we describe an updated protocol for high-resolution method for mapping epitopes of antibodies based on bacterial surface expression of antigen fragments followed by antibody-based flow cytometric analysis. Epitopes are determined by DNA sequencing of the sorted antibody-binding cells followed by sequence alignment back to the antigen sequence. The method described here has been useful for the mapping of both monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies with varying sizes of epitopes.

Combination of phage and Gram-positive bacterial display of human antibody repertoires enables isolation of functional high affinity binders.

Surface display couples genotype with a surface exposed phenotype and thereby allows screening of gene-encoded protein libraries for desired characteristics. Of the various display systems available, phage display is by far the most popular, mainly thanks to its ability to harbour large size libraries. Here, we describe the first use of a Gram-positive bacterial host for display of a library of human antibody genes which, when combined with phage display, provides ease of use for screening, sorting and ranking by flow cytometry. We demonstrate the utility of this method by identifying low nanomolar affinity scFv fragments towards human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). The ranking and performance of the scFv isolated by flow sorting in surface-immobilised form was retained when expressed as soluble scFv and analysed by biolayer interferometry, as well as after expression as full-length antibodies in mammalian cells. We also demonstrate the possibility of using Gram-positive bacterial display to directly improve the affinity of the identified binders via an affinity maturation step using random mutagenesis and flow sorting. This combined approach has the potential for a more complete scan of the antibody repertoire and for affinity maturation of human antibody formats.

Stratification of responders towards eculizumab using a structural epitope mapping strategy.

The complement component 5 (C5)-binding antibody eculizumab is used to treat patients with paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria (PNH) and atypical haemolytic uremic syndrome (aHUS). As recently reported there is a need for a precise classification of eculizumab responsive patients to allow for a safe and cost-effective treatment. To allow for such stratification, knowledge of the precise binding site of the drug on its target is crucial. Using a structural epitope mapping strategy based on bacterial surface display, flow cytometric sorting and validation via haemolytic activity testing, we identified six residues essential for binding of eculizumab to C5. This epitope co-localizes with the contact area recently identified by crystallography and includes positions in C5 mutated in non-responders. The identified epitope also includes residue W917, which is unique for human C5 and explains the observed lack of cross-reactivity for eculizumab with other primates. We could demonstrate that Ornithodorus moubata complement inhibitor (OmCI), in contrast to eculizumab, maintained anti-haemolytic function for mutations in any of the six epitope residues, thus representing a possible alternative treatment for patients non-responsive to eculizumab. The method for stratification of patients described here allows for precision medicine and should be applicable to several other diseases and therapeutics.

Proteome-wide epitope mapping of antibodies using ultra-dense peptide arrays.

Antibodies are of importance for the field of proteomics, both as reagents for imaging cells, tissues, and organs and as capturing agents for affinity enrichment in mass-spectrometry-based techniques. It is important to gain basic insights regarding the binding sites (epitopes) of antibodies and potential cross-reactivity to nontarget proteins. Knowledge about an antibody's linear epitopes is also useful in, for instance, developing assays involving the capture of peptides obtained from trypsin cleavage of samples prior to mass spectrometry analysis. Here, we describe, for the first time, the design and use of peptide arrays covering all human proteins for the analysis of antibody specificity, based on parallel in situ photolithic synthesis of a total of 2.1 million overlapping peptides. This has allowed analysis of on- and off-target binding of both monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies, complemented with precise mapping of epitopes based on full amino acid substitution scans. The analysis suggests that linear epitopes are relatively short, confined to five to seven residues, resulting in apparent off-target binding to peptides corresponding to a large number of unrelated human proteins. However, subsequent analysis using recombinant proteins suggests that these linear epitopes have a strict conformational component, thus giving us new insights regarding how antibodies bind to their antigens.

Epitope mapping of monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies using bacterial cell surface display.

The unique property of specific high-affinity binding to more or less any target of interest has made antibodies tremendously useful in numerous applications. Hence knowledge of the precise binding site (epitope) of antibodies on the target protein is one of the most important features for understanding its performance and determining its reliability in immunoassays. Here, we describe a high-resolution method for mapping epitopes of antibodies based on bacterial surface expression of antigen fragments followed by antibody-based flow cytometric sorting. Epitopes are determined by DNA sequencing of the sorted antibody-binding cells followed by sequence alignment back to the antigen sequence. The method described here has been useful for the mapping of both monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies with varying sizes of epitopes.

Generation of HER2 monoclonal antibodies using epitopes of a rabbit polyclonal antibody.

One of the issues in using polyclonal antibodies is the limited amount of reagent available from an immunisation, leading to batch-to-batch variation and difficulties in obtaining the same antibody performance when the same antigen is re-immunised into several separate animals. This led to the development of hybridoma technology allowing, at least theoretically, for an unlimited production of a specific binder. Nevertheless, polyclonal antibodies are widely used in research and diagnostics and there exists a need for robust methods to convert a polyclonal antibody with good binding performance into a renewable monoclonal with identical or similar binding specificity. Here we have used precise information regarding the functional recognition sequence (epitope) of a rabbit polyclonal antibody with attractive binding characteristics as the basis for generation of a renewable mouse monoclonal antibody. First, the original protein fragment antigen was used for immunisation and generation of mouse hybridoma, without obtaining binders to the same epitope region. Instead a peptide designed using the functional epitope and structural information was synthesised and used for hybridoma production. Several of the monoclonal antibodies generated were found to have similar binding characteristics to those of the original polyclonal antibody. These monoclonal antibodies detected native HER2 on cell lines and were also able to stain HER2 in immunohistochemistry using xenografted mice, as well as human normal and cancer tissues.