Construcció i avaluació de seqüències de proteïna VP1 i la seva aplicació al disseny de vacunes sintètiques per al virus de la febre aftosa

The VP1 gen of the foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) will be cloned and expressed in "E.Coli". Mutant protein will be produced by directed mutagenesis. Parallel to this, peptides will be synthetised to reproduce the epitopes of this protein relevant to the anti-FMVD immune response and others with substitutions of specific amino-acids. The design of these protein sequences will be carried out on the basis of the sequences of nucleotide obtained from circular variants of the virus, from mutant resistiant to neutralised monoclonal antibodies (MAs) and from statistical treatment of the aforementioned sequences in order to determine frequent, strange and incompatible substitutions. Both the above mentioned protein and the synthetic peptides will be tested for with anti-FMDV MAs, to determine specific sequences of vaccinal interest; with greater probability of producing protective responses