Pharmaceutical or food composition for treating pathologies associated with graft rejection or an allergic or autoimmune reaction

Abstract

The present invention is related to a process for obtaining a composition comprising peptides bound to one or more heat shock protein(s) and for possibly recovering from said composition the bound peptides, wherein the peptides resulting from a previously in-vitro hydrolysis of at least one immunogenic and antigenic macromolecular structure, are mixed in-vitro with one or more heat shock protein(s). The present invention is also related to the compositions obtained by said process.

1 . A process for epitope mapping comprising the steps of 
 hydrolyzing in-vitro at least one immunogenic or antigenic macromolecular structure to obtain peptides    mixing said peptides and at least one heat shock protein under conditions allowing the formation of complexes    removing unbound peptides    recovering peptides from said complexes.    
     
     
         2 - 17 . cancelled  
     
     
         18 . The method of  claim 1  wherein said at least one heat shock protein is a bacterial heat shock protein.  
     
     
         19 . The process of  claim 18  wherein said bacterial heat shock protein is selected from the group consisting of the DnaK, DnaJ, GroEL or GrpE heat shock proteins.  
     
     
         20 . The process of  claim 1  wherein the at least one immunogenic or antigenic macromolecular structure is a protein.  
     
     
         21 . The process of  claim 1  wherein the at least one immunogenic or antigenic macromolecular structure induces graft rejection.  
     
     
         22 . The process of  claim 1  wherein the at least one immunogenic or antigenic macromolecular structure induces an allergic reaction.  
     
     
         23 . The process of  claim 1  wherein the at least one immunogenic or antigenic macromolecular structure induces an auto-immune disease or autoimmune reaction.  
     
     
         24 . The process of  claim 1  wherein the at least one immunogenic or antigenic macromolecular structure is denatured prior the in-vitro hydrolysis, either by physical or by chemical methods.  
     
     
         25 . The process of  claim 1  wherein hydrolysis is a chemical hydrolysis.  
     
     
         26 . The process of  claim 1  wherein hydrolysis is a enzymatic hydrolysis.  
     
     
         27 . A peptide of an epitope identified by the process of  claim 1 .  
     
     
         28 . Pharmaceutical of food composition comprising the peptide of  claim 27.