PREDICTION OF B-CELL EPITOPES FOR SALMONELLA-TYPHI OMPC

The possible B-cell epitopes of the outer membrane porin OmpC of Salmonella typhi have been identified, using the primary structure of the protein, by means of multiple sequence alignment and the known molecular structure of two other porins. From the analysis, 8 regions were identified as immunodominant and these were ranked based on antigenic index and the ratio of the number of nonconserved residues to the fragment length. Model building of the top two ranked regions show the tendency to form loop structures supporting the possibility of these being candidate epitopes.