Method of determining mimotopes

Claim 1

A method of determining the sequences of amino acids which is a conformational equivalent of an epitope which is complementary to a particular paratope of an antibody of interest, the method comprising the steps of: a. synthesizing a plurality of catamer preparations; each catamer having at least four positions; each of said catamer preparations consisting of a plurality of catamers made of a defined set of at least four amino acids and in which: (i) a residue at two or more designated positions in each catamer are known and are constant for each catamer in the catamer preparation ("constant positions"), (ii) the residue at each of the remaining positions is randomly made up from members selected from said defined set of amino acids ("random positions"); wherein at least two of the positions of said catamer are random; and (iii) said plurality of catamer preparations comprising preparations in which the residue at the designated positions is systematically varied to contain members from said defined set of amino acids, wherein the number of catamers in said catamer preparation is the product of the number of amino acids selected for each random position; b. contacting each of said plurality of catamer preparations with the antibody of interest; c. detecting the presence or absence of binding between each of said plurality of catamer preparations and said given antibody; d. determining a partial sequence of amino acids for the conformational equivalent of an epitope which is complementary to the particular paratope of said antibody from the known residue at two or more designated positions in each of said plurality of catamer preparations that bind to said antibody; e. synthesizing a further plurality of catamer preparations as defined in step a and which include the composition of the partial sequence as determined in said step d as initial designation positions, each of said further plurality of catamer preparations having at least one additional position in each catamer as a designated position; and f. repeating steps b, c and d with said further plurality of catamer preparations.

Claim 2

A method of determining the sequences of amino acids which is a conformational equivalent of an epitope which is complementary to a particular paratope of an antibody of interest, the method comprising the steps of: a. synthesizing a plurality of catamer preparations; each catamer having at least four positions; each of said catamer preparations consisting of a plurality of catamers made of a defined set of at least four amino acids and in which: (i) a residue at two or more designated positions in each catamer are known and are constant for each catamer in the catamer preparation ("constant positions"), (ii) the residue at each of the remaining positions is randomly made up from members selected from said defined set of amino acids ("random positions"); wherein at least two of the positions of said catamer are random; and (iii) said plurality of catamer preparations comprising preparations in which the residue at the designated positions is systematically varied to contain members from said defined set of amino acids, wherein the number of catamers in said catamer preparation is the product of the number of amino acids selected for each random position; b. contacting each of said plurality of catamer preparations with the antibody of interest; c. detecting the presence or absence of binding between each of said plurality of catamer preparations and said given antibody; d. determining a partial sequence of amino acids for the conformational equivalent of an epitope which is complementary to the particular paratope of said antibody from the known residue at two or more designated positions in each of said plurality of catamer preparations that bind to said antibody; e. synthesizing a further plurality of catamer preparations as defined in step a and which include the composition of the partial sequence as determined in said step d as initial designation positions, each of said further plurality of catamer preparations having at least one additional position in each catamer as a designated position; and f. repeating steps b, c and d with said further plurality of catamer preparations.