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Infection and Immunity, June 2003, p. 3485-3495, Vol. 71, No. 6
0019-9567/03/$08.00+0     DOI: 10.1128/IAI.71.6.3485-3495.2003
Copyright © 2003, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Genetic Diversity and Antigenic Polymorphism in Plasmodium falciparum: Extensive Serological Cross-Reactivity between Allelic Variants of Merozoite Surface Protein 2

Simon Franks,^1, Luke Baton,^2,3 Kevin Tetteh,² Eric Tongren,² David Dewin,² Bartholomew D. Akanmori,⁴ Kojo A. Koram,⁴ Lisa Ranford-Cartwright,^1,3 and Eleanor M. Riley^1,2*

Institute of Cell, Animal and Population Biology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3JT,¹ Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London WC1E 7HT,² Division of Infection and Immunity, Institute of Biomedical and Life Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QQ, United Kingdom,³ Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, University of Ghana, Legon, Ghana⁴

Received 7 August 2002/ Returned for modification 5 December 2002/ Accepted 24 February 2003

Diversity in the surface antigens of malaria parasites is generally assumed to be a mechanism for immune evasion, but there is little direct evidence that this leads to evasion of protective immunity. Here we show that alleles of the highly polymorphic merozoite surface protein 2 (MSP-2) can be grouped (within the known dimorphic families) into distinct serogroups; variants within a serogroup show extensive serological cross-reactivity. Cross-reactive epitopes are immunodominant, and responses to them may be boosted at the expense of responses to novel epitopes (original antigenic sin). The data imply that immune selection explains only some of the diversity in the msp-2 gene and that MSP-2 vaccines may need to include only a subset of the known variants in order to induce pan-reactive antibodies.

Editor: S. H. E. Kaufmann

Present address: The Eilean Ban Trust, Kyleakin, Isle of Skye, Scotland, United Kingdom.

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