Peptides derived from insulin granule proteins are targeted by CD8+ T cells across MHC Class I restrictions in humans and NOD mice

The antigenic peptides processed by β cells and presented through surface HLA Class I molecules are poorly characterized. Each HLA variant, e.g. the most common HLA-A2 and HLA-A3, carries some peptide-binding specificity. Hence, features that, despite these specificities, remain shared across variants may reveal factors favoring β-cell immunogenicity. Building on our previous description of the HLA-A2/A3 peptidome of β cells, we analyzed the HLA-A3-restricted peptides targeted by circulating CD8⁺ T cells. Several peptides were recognized by CD8⁺ T cells within a narrow frequency (1-50/10⁶), which was similar in donors with and without type 1 diabetes and harbored variable effector/memory fractions. These epitopes could be classified as conventional peptides or neo-epitopes, generated either via peptide cis-splicing or mRNA splicing, e.g. secretogranin-5 (SCG5)-009. As reported for HLA-A2-restricted peptides, several epitopes originated from β-cell granule proteins, e.g. SCG3, SCG5 and urocortin-3. Similarly, H-2K^d-restricted CD8⁺ T cells recognizing the murine orthologues of SCG5, urocortin-3, and proconvertase-2 infiltrated the islets of NOD mice and transferred diabetes into NOD/scid recipients. The finding of granule proteins targeted in both humans and NOD mice supports their disease relevance and identifies the insulin granule as a rich source of epitopes, possibly reflecting its impaired processing in type 1 diabetes.