View abstract

This abstract is assigned to sessions

Presentation preference	Oral presentation
Title	HLA-A29 does not present immunogenic epitopes of the Retinal S-Antigen in patients with Birdshot Uveitis

Purpose	Retinal arrestin (Retinal S-antigen) is widely considered as the candidate autoantigen for Birdshot Uveitis, a severe inflammatory eye condition that only affects HLA-A29-positive individuals.
Methods	We studied the HLA-A29 immunopeptidome from patient-derived cells engineered to stably express the retinal S-antigen by mass spectrometry.
Results	Among peptides presented by HLA-A29, we identified two peptides derived from the retinal S-antigen that were also in vitro substrates of the antigen presentation aminopeptidases ERAP1 and ERAP2 that are genetically implicated in the pathogenesis of Birdshot Uveitis. Multiplexed HLA-A29-peptide dextramer analysis revealed no enrichment for antigen-specific T cells reactive to the identified retinal S-antigen peptides in blood of patients or HLA-A29-positive controls.
Conclusion	These results indicate that the retinal S-antigen is unlikely a primary autoantigen for birdshot uveitis.
Conflict of interest	No

Authors 1

Last name	HIDDINGH
Initials of first name(s)	S
Department	CTI/Ophthalmology
City	Utrecht
Country	Netherlands

Authors 2

Last name	Venema
Initials of first name(s)	WJ
Department	CTI/Ophthalmology
City	Utrecht
Country	Netherlands

Authors 3

Last name	Claas
Initials of first name(s)	FHJ
Department	Immunology
City	Leiden
Country	Netherlands

Authors 4

Last name	Mulder
Initials of first name(s)	A
Department	Immunology
City	Leiden
Country	Netherlands

Authors 5

Last name	Janssen
Initials of first name(s)	GMC
Department	Center for Proteomics and Metabolomics
City	Leiden
Country	Netherlands

Authors 6

Last name	de Boer
Initials of first name(s)	JH
Department	Ophthalmology
City	Utrecht
Country	Netherlands

Authors 7

Last name	van Veelen
Initials of first name(s)	PA
Department	Center for Proteomics and Metabolomics
City	Leiden
Country	Netherlands

Authors 8

Last name	Kuiper
Initials of first name(s)	JJW
Department	Ophthalmology/CTI
City	Utrecht
Country	Netherlands