„How MHC I Peptides Are Generated for Viral and Cancer Immunosurveillance“

The talk focuses on peptide generation from DRiPs (defective ribosomal products), ribosomal generated polypeptides that don’t achieve folded stable forms and are proteolytically converted into peptides presented by MHC I molecules for CD8+ T cell immunosurveillance. Influenza A virus DRiPs will occupy center stage. I will discuss dozens of novel influenza virus gene products we discovered in characterizing DRiPs. These include PB1-F2, the granddaddy of flu alternative reading frame proteins, UFOs generated from host mRNA start codons, and most recently, numerous open reading frames encoded by the negative strand. The talk will conclude with a brief discussion of DRiPs and cancer, and the contribution of “immunoribosomes“ (subsets of ribosomes) to the cancer immuopeptidome.