Publication Type
Journal Article
Publication Date (Issue Year)
2024
Journal Name
FEBS Open Bio
Abstract
Maize lethal necrosis (MLN) is a maize disease caused by the maize chlorotic mottle virus (MCMV), a potyvirus which causes yield losses of 30–100%. The present study aimed to isolate nanobodies against the MCMV coat protein (CP) for the diagnosis of MLN. MCMV CP expressed in Escherichia coli was used for llama immunization. VHH (i.e. variable heavy domain of heavy chain) gene fragments were prepared from blood drawn from the immunized llama and used to generate a library in E. coli TG1 cells. MCMV specific nanobodies were selected by three rounds of phage display and panning against MCMV CP. The selected nanobodies were finally expressed in E. coli WK6 cells and purified. Eleven MCMV-specific nanobodies were identified and shown to detect MCMV in infected maize plants. Thus, our results show that nanobodies isolated from llama immunized with MCMV CP can distinguish infected and healthy maize plants, potentially enabling development of affordable MCMV detection protocols.
Keywords
antigen, MCMV; MLN, nanobodies, protein expression, single domain antibody
Rsif Scholar Name
Faith Njeri Njeru
Thematic Area
Food security and Agribusiness
Africa Host University (AHU)
Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA), Tanzania
Recommended Citation
Njeru, F. N., Zwaenepoel, O., Haesaert, G., Jonghe, K., & Gettemans, J. (2024). Development of nanobodies against the coat protein of maize chlorotic mottle virus. FEBS Open Bio, 14 (10), 1746-1757. https://doi.org/10.1002/2211-5463.13882