To study the immune response induced by tandem gene of mimic epitopes in hypervariable region 1 of HCV

Objective: to study the characteristic of immune response induced by tandem gene of mimic epitopes in hypervariable region 1 of HCV. Methods: 10 Balb/C mice were divided into two groups.Group one was immuned with plasmid pCDNA3.1-target gene and group two was immuned with plasmid pCDNA3.1.Splenocyte proliferation was tested by ³H-TdR proliferation assay and the level of cytokines in culture supernatant was tested by ELISA. Results: splenocyte of immuned mice were proliferate greatly when stimulated by HVR1 antigen synthetic peptides.The PI were 71.45±3.1,12.64±2.5,10.05±1.9,and 31.20±2.4 respectively after stimulate by peptide 1,2,3 or 4.IL-4,IL-10,IFN-γ and TNF-α also increased in culture supernant. Conclusion: the level of Th1 and Th2 cytokines were increased after immunation and epitope-specific cellular immune response was induced.