In order to determine the sensitivity and reliability of antirotaviral fecal immunoglobulin A (IgA) as an indicator of rotavirus reinfection, the antibody responses to rotavirus of 44 infants with severe rotavirus gastroenteritis recruited on admission to a hospital were studied. Feces were collected daily during hospitalization and weekly thereafter, and sera were obtained every 4 months, for ...

....................................................................................................................................................... 79 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................................. 80 NUMBER OF ANTIGENIC DETERMINANTS ON β1-Bgt ........................................

The identification and characterization of conserved epitopes on the HIV-1 viral spike that are immunogenic in humans and targeted by neutralizing antibodies is an important step in vaccine design. Antibody cloning experiments revealed that 32% of all HIV-neutralizing antibodies expressed by the memory B cells in patients with high titers of broadly neutralizing antibodies recognize one or more...

Neutralizing activity against primary human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) isolates from 17 persons who were long-term disease nonprogressors (LTNPs) and 13 persons who were fast progressors (FPs) was compared. Sera from LTNPs showed higher neutralizing activity both in titer and in host spectrum than did sera from FPs. However, LTNP sera had limited neutralizing activity against HIV-1 s...

Viral subunit vaccines often contain immunodominant non-neutralizing epitopes that divert host immune responses. These epitopes should be eliminated in vaccine design, but there is no reliable method for evaluating an epitope's capacity to elicit neutralizing immune responses. Here we introduce a new concept 'neutralizing immunogenicity index' (NII) to evaluate an epitope's neutralizing immunog...

A neutralizing agent combination strategy was developed to enhance the succinic acid production by Actinobacillus succinogenes ATCC 55618. First, a maximal succinic acid production of 48.2 g/L was obtained at a culture pH of 7.5. Second, NaOH and KOH were screened to identify the optimal neutralizing agent for pH control. However, the production of succinic acid did not increase, and severe cel...

Subunit vaccines formulated with purified fusion proteins from the A2 (PFP-2) or attenuated 248/404 (PFP-3) strains of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) were evaluated, either alone or in combination with native attachment (G) protein, for their ability to augment serum neutralizing antibody titers in seropositive chimpanzees. The results suggested that combination vaccines enhanced serum neutr...

Pre-existing immunity is an important factor countering the pandemic potential of an emerging influenza virus strain. Thus, studying of pre-existing immunity to the 2009 pandemic H1N1 virus (2009 H1N1) will advance our understanding of the pathogenesis and epidemiology of this emerging pathogen. In the present study, sera were collected from 486 individuals in a hospital in Shanghai, China, bef...

Protective antibodies play a critical role in an effective HIV vaccine; however, eliciting antibodies to block infection by viruses from diverse genetic subtypes remains a major challenge. As the world's most populous country, China has been under the threat of at least three major subtypes of circulating HIV-1 viruses. Understanding the cross reactivity and specificities of serum antibody resp...

Neutralization of varicella-zoster (V-Z) virus by human sera and immune rhesus monkey sera was enhanced by fresh guinea pig complement. There was no marked difference in the degree to which complement enhanced neutralization by sera from current V-Z virus infections and sera from long-past varicella infections. Immunoglobulin G neutralizing antibody in sera from varicella cases was enhanced by ...