Bibliographic
To avoid problems associated with active immunization (e.g., AN-1792) of elderly AD patients, the authors have developed an active vaccination strategy using peptide- or DNA-based epitope vaccines. Here, the authors tested the efficacy of the DNA epitope vaccine p3Abeta 1–11-PADRE and the same vaccine fused with a component of complement 3C3d (p3Abeta 1–11-PADRE-3C3d) in a transgenic (Tg) mouse model of AD (Tg2576), of the H2bxs immune haplotype. The overall responses to both vaccines were very weak in Tg2576 mice despite the fact that the 3C3d molecular adjuvant significantly enhanced the anti-Abeta response to 3Abeta 1–11-PADRE. Importantly, generation of low antibody responses was associated with the strain of amyloid precursor protein Tg mice rather than with a molecular adjuvant, as a p3Abeta 1–11-PADRE-3C3d vaccine induced significantly higher antibody production in another AD mouse model- 3xTg-AD of the H2b haplotype. This study demonstrated that low concentrations of antibodies generated by both DNA vaccines were not sufficient for the reduction of Abeta pathology in the brains of vaccinated Tg2576 animals, confirming previous reports from preclinical studies and the AN-1792 clinical trials. These studies concluded that the concentration of anti-Abeta antibodies may be essential for the reduction of AD pathology.
Therapeutic Agent
Animal Model
Experimental Design
Dosage, formulation and other details regarding immunization of mice are given in: Ghochikyan, A., Vasilevko, V., Petrushina, I., Tran, M., Sadzikava, N., Babikyan, D., Movsesyan, N., Tian, W., Ross, T.M., Cribbs, D.H., and Agadjanyan, M.G. (2003). Generation and characterization of the humoral immune response to DNA immunization with a chimeric b-amyloid-interleukin-4 minigene. Eur. J. Immunol. 33, 3232–3241 and Movsesyan, N., Ghochikyan, A., Mkrtichyan, M., Petrushina, I., Davtyan, H., Olkhanud, P.B., Head, E., Biragyn, A., Cribbs, D.H., and Agadjanyan, M.G. (2008a). Reducing AD-like pathology in 3xTg-AD mouse model by DNA epitope vaccine— a novel immunotherapeutic strategy. PLoS One 3, e21–e24.