Computational Evaluation of the B-Cell Epitope of 37-kDa Outer Membrane Protein H Pasteurella multocida Type B from Nusa Tenggara Timur, IndonesiaTenggara Timur, Indonesia

HS is still a frequently reported endemic disease, with outbreaks in Indonesia. HS vaccines distributed in Indonesia exhibit various limitations. This study computationally evaluated the B-cell epitope of the 37-kDa OmpH derived from the amino acid sequence of Pasteurella multocida from the NTT and Katha strains and compared the epitopes of the two strains. Amino acid sequences were obtained from NCBI and analyzed for multiple sequence alignment, and homology was analyzed using the BLASTp program at NCBI. Epitope prediction was performed using the IEDB B-cell epitope and ABCPred prediction tools. The VaxiJen v.2 online platform was used for antigenicity analysis, and IEDB was used for epitope conservancy analysis. The results of the homology analysis revealed that local NTT isolates had a high (>95%) identity with the Katha strain and isolates from China, India, Iran, Japan, and the USA. The epitope predictions from both methods were cross-checked, overlapping epitopes were shortlisted, and only five epitopes were predicted. Among the five, one epitope, ALEVGLN, appeared to be antigenic to both NTT and Katha strains. The antigenic sequence of 37 kDa OmpH can be used for peptide-based vaccine development and immunotherapeutic design.