Serodominant SARS-CoV-2 Nucleocapsid Peptides Map to Unstructured Protein Regions.

ABSTRACT: The SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid (N) protein is highly immunogenic, and anti-N antibodies are commonly used as markers for prior infection. While several studies have examined or predicted the antigenic regions of N, these have lacked consensus and structural context. Using COVID-19 patient sera to probe an overlapping peptide array, we identified six public and four private epitope regions across N, some of which are unique to this study. We further report the first deposited X-ray structure of the stable dimerization domain at 2.05 Å as similar to all other reported structures. Structural mapping revealed that most epitopes are derived from surface-exposed loops on the stable domains or from the unstructured linker regions. An antibody response to an epitope in the stable RNA binding domain w

SUBMITTER: Vandervaart JP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10269789 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature