By-passing immunisation. Human antibodies from synthetic repertoires of germline VH gene segments rearranged in vitro.

By display of antibody repertoires on the surface of a filamentous bacteriophage and selection of the phage by binding to antigen, we can mimic immune selection. Recently, by tapping the repertoire of rearranged V-genes from the peripheral blood lymphocytes of unimmunised donors, we succeeded in making human antibody fragments with different specificities, including both haptens and proteins, from the same library of phage. Now we have built a repertoire of human VH genes from 49 human germline VH gene segments rearranged in vitro to create a synthetic third complementarity determining region (CDR) of five or eight residues. The rearranged VH genes were cloned with a human V lambda 3 light chain as single chain Fv fragments for phage display, and the library of phage panned by binding to each of two haptens, 2-phenyl-5-oxazolone (phOx) or 3-iodo-4-hydroxy-5-nitrophenyl-acetate (NIP) coupled to bovine serum albumin (BSA). Many different antibody fragments were isolated which bound specifically to hapten, some with affinities in the micromolar range. The in vitro "immune response" to the hapten NIP was dominated by the 9-1 segment (VH3 family), and that to phOx by the VH26 segment (VH3 family) with an invariant aromatic residue (Tyr, Phe, Trp) at residue 97 of CDR3. However, the isolation of phage against protein antigens proved more elusive, with a single phage binding to human tumour necrosis factor, and none to bovine serum albumin, turkey egg-white lysozyme or human thyroglobulin. Nevertheless, the work shows that human antibody fragments with specific binding activities can be made entirely in vitro.     

Mimicking Somatic Hypermutation: Affinity Maturation of Antibodies Displayed on Bacteriophage Using a Bacterial Mutator Strain

Human antibodies can now be isolated from antibody repertoires displayed on the surface of filamentous bacteriophage in a process that mimics the primary immune response. Here we have attempted to mimic the secondary response, the natural process of affinity maturation of antibodies occurring in germinal centres, by multiple cycles of random mutation and selection. Phage displaying a human antibody fragment recognising the hapten 2-phenyl-5-oxazolone were grown in a mutator strain of bacteria (Escherichia coli: mutD5) to generate a large repertoire of antibodies that should include the majority of possible single nucleotide point mutations. The repertoire of phage antibody mutants was then selected by binding to hapten. By multiple rounds of growth in the mutator strain, and increasingly stringent selection, we succeeded in isolating mutants with improved binding affinities; furthermore, the distribution of mutations and nucleotide substitution preferences strongly resembled those of somatic hypermutation. We then constructed a genealogical tree from the sequences of mutants taken at different rounds, and identified four sequentially acquired mutations that together improve the binding affinity of the antibody by a factor of 100-fold (fromK_d320 nM to 3.2 nM).     

Antibody fragments from a ''single pot'' phage display library as immunochemical reagents.

The display of repertoires of antibody fragments on the surface of filamentous bacteriophage offers a new way of making antibodies with predefined binding specificities. Here we explored the use of this technology to make immunochemical reagents to a range of antigens by selection from a repertoire of > 10(8) clones made in vitro from human V gene segments. From the same 'single pot' repertoire, phage were isolated with binding activities to each of 18 antigens, including the intracellular proteins p53, elongation factor EF-1 alpha, immunoglobulin binding protein, rhombotin-2 oncogene protein and sex determining region Y protein. Both phage and scFv fragments secreted from infected bacteria were used as monoclonal and polyclonal reagents in Western blots. Furthermore the monoclonal reagents were used for epitope mapping (a new epitope of p53 was identified) and for staining of cells. This shows that antibody reagents for research can be readily derived from 'single pot' phage display libraries.     

Phage versus phagemid libraries for generation of human monoclonal antibodies

Non-immune (na?ve) phage antibody libraries have become an important source of antibodies for reagent, diagnostic, and therapeutic use. To date, reported na?ve libraries have been constructed in phagemid vectors as fusions to pIII, yielding primarily single copy (monovalent) display of antibody fragments. For this work, we subcloned the single chain Fv (scFv) gene repertoire from a na?ve phagemid antibody library into a true phage vector to create a multivalently displayed scFv phage library. Compared to monovalently displayed scFv, multivalent phage display resulted in improved efficiency of display as well as antibody selection. A greater number of antibodies were obtained and at earlier rounds of selection. Such increased efficiency allows the screening for binding antibodies after a single round of selection, greatly facilitating automation. Expression levels of antigen-binding scFv were also higher than from the phagemid library. In contrast, the affinities of scFv from the phage library were lower than from the phagemid library. This could be overcome by utilizing the scFv in a multivalent format, by affinity maturation, or by converting the library to monovalent display after the first round of selection.     

In vitro affinity maturation of a natural human antibody overcomes a barrier to in vivo affinity maturation

Antibodies isolated from human donors are increasingly being developed for anti-infective therapeutics. These antibodies undergo affinity maturation in vivo, minimizing the need for engineering of therapeutic leads for affinity. However, the affinities required for some therapeutic applications may be higher than the affinities of the leads obtained, requiring further affinity maturation in vitro. To improve the neutralization potency of natural human antibody MSL-109 targeting human cytomegalovirus (CMV), we affinity matured the antibody against the gH/gL glycoprotein complex. A phage display library where most of the six complementary-determining regions (CDRs) were allowed to vary in only one amino acid residue at a time was used to scan for mutations that improve binding affinity. A T55R mutation and multiple mutations in position 53 of the heavy chain were identified that, when present individually or in combination, resulted in higher apparent affinities to gH/gL and improved CMV neutralization potency of Fab fragments expressed in bacterial cells. Three of these mutations in position 53 introduced glycosylation sites in heavy chain CDR 2 (CDR H2) that impaired binding of antibodies expressed in mammalian cells. One high affinity (K_D < 10 pM) variant was identified that combined the D53N and T55R mutations while avoiding glycosylation of CDR H2. However, all the amino acid substitutions identified by phage display that improved binding affinity without introducing glycosylation sites required between two and four simultaneous nucleotide mutations to avoid glycosylation. These results indicate that the natural human antibody MSL-109 is close to a local affinity optimum. We show that affinity maturation by phage display can be used to identify and bypass barriers to in vivo affinity maturation of antibodies imposed by glycosylation and codon usage. These constraints may be relatively prevalent in human antibodies due to the codon usage and the amino acid sequence encoded by the natural human repertoire.     

In vitro affinity maturation of a natural human antibody overcomes a barrier to in vivo affinity maturation

Antibodies isolated from human donors are increasingly being developed for anti-infective therapeutics. These antibodies undergo affinity maturation in vivo, minimizing the need for engineering of therapeutic leads for affinity. However, the affinities required for some therapeutic applications may be higher than the affinities of the leads obtained, requiring further affinity maturation in vitro. To improve the neutralization potency of natural human antibody MSL-109 targeting human cytomegalovirus (CMV), we affinity matured the antibody against the gH/gL glycoprotein complex. A phage display library where most of the six complementary-determining regions (CDRs) were allowed to vary in only one amino acid residue at a time was used to scan for mutations that improve binding affinity. A T55R mutation and multiple mutations in position 53 of the heavy chain were identified that, when present individually or in combination, resulted in higher apparent affinities to gH/gL and improved CMV neutralization potency of Fab fragments expressed in bacterial cells. Three of these mutations in position 53 introduced glycosylation sites in heavy chain CDR 2 (CDR H2) that impaired binding of antibodies expressed in mammalian cells. One high affinity (K_D < 10 pM) variant was identified that combined the D53N and T55R mutations while avoiding glycosylation of CDR H2. However, all the amino acid substitutions identified by phage display that improved binding affinity without introducing glycosylation sites required between two and four simultaneous nucleotide mutations to avoid glycosylation. These results indicate that the natural human antibody MSL-109 is close to a local affinity optimum. We show that affinity maturation by phage display can be used to identify and bypass barriers to in vivo affinity maturation of antibodies imposed by glycosylation and codon usage. These constraints may be relatively prevalent in human antibodies due to the codon usage and the amino acid sequence encoded by the natural human repertoire.     

人源噬菌体抗体库的构建及抗VEGF抗体的初步筛选分析

应用噬菌体表面呈递技术构建人抗体组合文库 .筛选获得了结合血管内皮细胞生长因子( VEGF)的人噬菌体 Fab抗体 ,并对所获抗体的多样性进行了进一步分析 .从不同人群外周血淋巴细胞提取总 RNA,经反转录后采用家族特异性免疫球蛋白可变区基因引物与免疫球蛋白信肽序列引物 ,通过改变 PCR条件或半套式扩增分别获得全部亚型的轻、重链抗体 Fab段 ,并重组到噬粒载体 p Comb3H中 ,经电转化大肠杆菌 XL- 1 Blue,构建了 1 .5× 1 0 8完整组合抗体库 .利用 VEGF12 1对该库经过 4轮固相筛选后 ,获得 1 2个可与 VEGF特异结合的阳性克隆 .酶谱分析表明了所获抗体克隆的多样性 .为通过基因工程改造 ,进一步获得可用于临床的人源 VEGF抗体奠定了基础 .     

Human anti-self antibodies with high specificity from phage display libraries.

Recently we demonstrated that human antibody fragments with binding activities against foreign antigens can be isolated from repertoires of rearranged V-genes derived from the mRNA of peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBLs) from unimmunized humans. The heavy and light chain V-genes were shuffled at random and cloned for display as single-chain Fv (scFv) fragments on the surface of filamentous phage, and the fragments selected by binding of the phage to antigen. Here we show that from the same phage library we can make scFv fragments encoded by both unmutated and mutated V-genes, with high specificities of binding to human self-antigens. Several of the affinity purified scFv fragments were shown to be a mixture of monomers and dimers in solution by FPLC gel filtration and the binding kinetics of the dimers were determined using surface plasmon resonance (k(on) = 10(5)-10(6) M-1s-1, k(off) = 10(-2)s-1 and Ka = 10(7) M-1). The kinetics of association are typical of known Ab-protein interactions, but the kinetics of dissociation are relatively fast. For therapeutic application, the binding affinities of such antibodies could be improved in vitro by mutation and selection for slower dissociation kinetics.     

Bicistronic DNA display for in vitro selection of Fab fragments

In vitro display methods are superior tools for obtaining monoclonal antibodies. Although totally in vitro display methods, such as ribosome display and mRNA display, have the advantages of larger library sizes and quicker selection procedures compared with phage display, their applications have been limited to single-chain Fvs due to the requirement for linking of the mRNA and the nascent protein on the ribosome. Here we describe a different type of totally in vitro method, DNA display, that is applicable to heterodimeric Fab fragments: in vitro compartmentalization in water-in-oil emulsions allows the linking of an oligomeric protein and its encoding DNA with multiple ORFs. Since previously used emulsions impaired the synthesis of functional Fab fragments, we modified conditions for preparing emulsions, and identified conditions under which it was possible to enrich Fab fragments 10⁶-fold per three rounds of affinity selection. Furthermore, we confirmed that genes encoding stable Fab fragments could be selected from a Fab fragment library with a randomized hydrophobic core in the constant region by applying heat treatment as a selection pressure. Since this method has all advantages of both phage display and totally in vitro display, it represents a new option for many applications using display methods.     

High-throughput affinity ranking of antibodies using surface plasmon resonance microarrays

A method was developed to rapidly identify high-affinity human antibodies from phage display library selection outputs. It combines high-throughput Fab fragment expression and purification with surface plasmon resonance (SPR) microarrays to determine kinetic constants (kon and koff) for 96 different Fab fragments in a single experiment. Fabs against human tissue kallikrein 1 (hK1, KLK1 gene product) were discovered by phage display, expressed in Escherichia coli in batches of 96, and purified using protein A PhyTip columns. Kinetic constants were obtained for 191 unique anti-hK1 Fabs using the Flexchip SPR microarray device. The highest affinity Fabs discovered had dissociation constants of less than 1 nM. The described SPR method was also used to categorize Fabs according to their ability to recognize an apparent active site epitope. The ability to rapidly determine the affinities of hundreds of antibodies significantly accelerates the discovery of high-affinity antibody leads.     

Generation and selection of immunized Fab phage display library against human B cell lymphoma

The approval of using monoclonal antibodies as a targeted therapy in the management of patients with B cell lymphoma has led to new treatment options for this group of patients. Production ofmonoclonal antibodies by the traditional hybridoma technology is costly, and the resulting murine antibodies often have the disadvantage of triggering human anti-mouse antibody （HAMA） response. Therefore recombinant Fab antibodies generated by the phage display technology can be a suitable alternative in managing B cell lymphoma. In this study, we extracted total RNA from spleen cells of BALB/c mice immunized with human B lymphoma cells, and used RT-PCR to amplify cDNAs coding for the κ light chains and Fd fragments of heavy chains. After appropriate restriction digests, these cDNA fragments were successively inserted into the phagemid vector pComb3H-SS to construct an immunized Fab phage display library. The diversity of the constructed library was approximately 1.94× 10^7. Following five rounds of biopanning, soluble Fab antibodies were produced from positive clones identified by ELISA. From eight positive clones, FabC06, FabC21, FabC43 and FabC59 were selected for sequence analysis. At the level of amino acid sequences, the variable heavy domains （VH） and variable light domains （VL） were found to share 88-92% and 89-94% homology with sequences coded by the corresponding murine germline genes respectively. Furthermore, reactivity with membrane proteins of the B cell lymphoma was demonstrated by immunohistochemistry and western blotting. These immunized Fab antibodies may provide a valuable tool for further study of B cell lymphoma and could also contribute to the improvement of disease therapy.     

Multi-subunit proteins on the surface of filamentous phage: methodologies for displaying antibody (Fab) heavy and light chains.

The display of proteins on the surface of phage offers a powerful means of selecting for rare genes encoding proteins with binding activities. Recently we found that antibody heavy and light chain variable (V) domains fused as a single polypeptide chain to a minor coat protein of filamentous phage fd, could be enriched by successive rounds of phage growth and panning with antigen. This allows the selection of antigen-binding domains directly from diverse libraries of V-genes. Now we show that heterodimeric Fab fragments can be assembled on the surface of the phage by linking one chain to the phage coat protein, and secreting the other into the bacterial periplasm. Furthermore by introducing an amber mutation between the antibody chain and the coat protein, we can either display the antibody on phage using supE strains of bacteria, or produce soluble Fab fragment using non-suppressor strains. The use of Fab fragments may offer advantages over single chain Fv fragments for construction of combinatorial libraries.     

A large non-immunized human Fab fragment phage library that permits rapid isolation and kinetic analysis of high affinity antibodies.

We report the design, construction, and use of the first very large non-immunized phage antibody library in Fab format, which allows the rapid isolation and affinity analysis of antigen-specific human antibody fragments. Individually cloned heavy and light chain variable region libraries were combined in an efficient two-step cloning procedure, permitting the cloning of a total of 3.7 x 10(10) independent Fab clones. The performance of the library was determined by the successful selection of on average 14 different Fabs against 6 antigens tested. These include tetanus toxoid, the hapten phenyl-oxazolone, the breast cancer-associated MUC1 antigen, and three highly related glycoprotein hormones: human chorionic gonadotropin, human luteinizing hormone, and human follicle-stimulating hormone. In the latter category, a panel of either homone-specific or cross-reactive antibodies were identified. The design of the library permits the monitoring of selections with polyclonal phage preparations and to carry out large scale screening of antibody off-rates with unpurified Fab fragments on BIAcore. Antibodies with off-rates in the order of 10(-2) to 10(-4) s-1 and affinities up to 2.7 nM were recovered. The kinetics of these phage antibodies are of the same order of magnitude as antibodies associated with a secondary immune response. This new phage antibody library is set to become a valuable source of antibodies to many different targets, and to play a vital role in target discovery and validation in the area of functional genomics.     

Guided selection of an anti-gamma-seminoprotein human Fab for antibody directed enzyme prodrug therapy of prostate cancer

Background The HAMA response is a major challenge when murine antibodies are repeatedly administered for antibody directed enzyme prodrug therapy in vivo. In this study we have achieved humanization of the anti-γ-seminoprotein E₄B₇ murine mAb by guided selection. Methods Using optimal Ig Fab primers, human Fd and CL gene repertoires were amplified by RT-PCR from PBMCs of prostate cancer patients. The human Lc gene repertoire was first paired with the murine Fd gene of E₄B₇ mAb to construct a pComb3X hybrid Fab display library. This hybrid library was screened with purified γ-seminoprotein antigen. The human Fd gene repertoire was then paired with the selected human Lc to construct a fully human Fab library. After four more rounds of panning, completely human Fab antibodies specific for γ-seminoprotein were selected and further identified. Results First, using the E₄B₇ Fd gene as a template, light chain shuffling was achieved by panning the hybrid library. Then, using the selected Lc as a template, a human Fab antibody against γ-seminoprotein was produced through heavy chain Fd shuffling. Western blotting, ELISA, and flow cytometry results demonstrated that the resulting human Fab antibody resembled the parental E₄B₇ mAb in that they both recognized the same epitope with similar affinities. Fluorescent cell staining and immunohistochemistry analysis further confirmed that this newly constructed human anti-γ-seminoprotein Fab antibody indeed specifically bound prostate cancer cells and tissue. Conclusions Through guided-selection, we successfully produced a human anti-γ-seminoprotein Fab antibody. This work lays the foundation for optimal antibody-directed enzyme prodrug therapy of prostate cancer using a fully human Fab antibody. Zhang Qing and Zhang Si-He are co-first authors on the publication.     

Expression cloning of cDNA by phage display selection.

Expression cloning of a mouse kappa chain fragment has been achieved from a cDNA library by display of expressed proteins on filamentous phage and affinity selection for binding to anti-mouse Fab antibodies. Expressed proteins were anchored to the phage coat by a synthetic, anti-parallel leucine zipper, which had been selected from a semi-randomized zipper library for the ability to connect a test protein to phage. From a library of 4 x 10(6) transformants, two separate clones displaying different size cDNA inserts were recovered after four selection rounds. These results further demonstrate the utility of phage display for cDNA expression cloning.     

抗松材线虫纤维素酶单链抗体库的构建及筛选

构建鼠源性松材线虫纤维素酶（Bursaphelenchus xylophilus cellulase, BXC）的噬菌体单链抗体库,从中筛选特异性BXC的单链抗体。以BXC为抗原免疫BALB/C小鼠,从脾脏提取总RNA,用RT-PCR技术扩增小鼠抗体重链（V_H）和轻链(V_L)可变区基因。经重叠PCR(SOE-PCR)在体外将V_H和V_L连接成单链抗体(scFv)基因,并克隆到噬菌粒载体pCANTAB5E中,电转化至大肠杆菌TG1,经辅助噬菌体超感染,成功构建了库容为5×10⁴的Anti-BXC单链抗体库,并从该抗体库中初步筛选到了特异性识别BXC的噬菌体单链抗体scFv。将表面展示单链抗体的单克隆噬菌体转化大肠杆菌HB2151进行可溶性表达,SDS-PAGE及Western blot分析结果显示,可溶性scFv获得表达,且与BXC具有结合活性,为松材线虫的检验检疫以及病理学研究奠定了基础。     

Selection of phage antibodies by binding affinity. Mimicking affinity maturation.

We describe a process, based on display of antibodies on the surface of filamentous bacteriophage, for selecting antibodies either by their affinity for antigen or by their kinetics of dissociation (off-rate) from antigen. For affinity selection, phage are mixed with small amounts of soluble biotinylated antigen (less than 1 microgram) such that the antigen is in excess over phage but with the concentration of antigen lower than the dissociation constant (Kd) of the antibody. Those phage bound to antigen are then selected using streptavidin-coated paramagnetic beads. The process can distinguish between antibodies with closely related affinities. For off-rate selection, antibodies are preloaded with biotinylated antigen and diluted into excess unlabelled antigen for variable times prior to capture on streptavidin-coated paramagnetic beads. To mimic the affinity maturation process of the immune system, we introduced random mutations into the antibody genes in vitro using an error-prone polymerase, and used affinity selection to isolate mutants with improved affinity. Starting with a small library (40,000 clones) of mutants (average 1.7 base changes per VH gene) of the mouse antibody B1.8, and using several rounds of affinity selection, we isolated a mutant with a fourfold improved affinity to the hapten 4-hydroxy-5-iodo-3-nitrophenacetyl-(NIP)-caproic acid (mutant Kd = 9.4(+/- 0.3) nM compared with B1.8 Kd = 41.9(+/- 1.6) nm). The relative increase in affinity of the mutant is comparable to the increase seen in the anti-4-hydroxy-3-nitrophenylacetyl/NIP-caproic acid murine secondary immune response.     

Strong in vivo maturation compensates for structurally restricted H3 loops in antibody repertoires

A central paradigm in immunology states that successful generation of high affinity antibodies necessitates an immense primary repertoire of antigen-combining sites. Much of the diversity of this repertoire is provided by varying one antigen binding loop, created by inserting randomly a D (diversity) gene out of a small pool between the V and J genes. It is therefore assumed that any particular D-encoded region surrounded by different V and J regions adopts a different conformation. We have solved the structure of two lysozyme-specific variable domains of heavy-chain antibodies isolated from two strictly unrelated dromedaries. These antibodies recombined identical D gene sequences to different V and J precursors with significant variance in their V(D)J junctions. Despite these large differences, the D-encoded loop segments adopt remarkably identical architectures, thus directing the antibodies toward identical epitopes. Furthermore, a striking convergent maturation process occurred in the V region, adapting both binders for their sub-nanomolar affinity association with lysozyme. Hence, on a structural level, humoral immunity may rely more on well developed maturation and selection systems than on the acquisition of large primary repertoires.