A novel DNA vaccine containing four mimicry epitopes for gastric cancer.

Gastric cancer is one of the most common malignant tumors in China. This paper focuses on the development of a DNA vaccine containing four mimotopes of MG7Ag for gastric cancer (multi-epitope vaccine). By inoculating BALB/c mice, the vaccine was characterized and compared with a similar vaccine containing only one mimotope (mono-epitope vaccine) and other controls. Cellular ELISA indicated that serum titer of antibody against MG7Ag was significantly higher in mice immunized with the multi-epitope vaccine than that in the group immunized with the mono-epitope vaccine (0.8627 vs. 0.6754, P < 0.05). And ELISPOT assay showed that the number of INF-y spots induced by multi-epitope vaccine was significantly larger than that of the group immunized with mono-epitope vaccine(93.3 vs. 70.7, P < 0.05). Two weeks after tumor challenge, the weight of tumor in each mouse was evaluated, and the tumor masses formed in the mice immunized with multi-epitope vaccine were markedly smaller than those formed in the mice immunized with mono-epitope vaccine. These studies demonstrated that both humoral and cellular response were induced by the two vaccines and the efficiency of multi-epitope vaccine is stronger than that of the mono-epitope vaccine.