These epitopes
appear to follow the general principles of T cell epitope
immunogenicity, and they show MHC molecule binding
kinetics that are similar to those of other immunodominant
viral epitopes. Most of the identified T cell
epitopes, for both CD4+ and CD8+ T cells, reside in the
NS3 protein, which represents only ~20% of the dengue
virus amino acid coding sequence. Limitations in
the availability of reagents may explain the apparent
immunodominance of NS3 for T cell recognition, at
least in part. However, a recent study using overlapping
peptides covering the entire DENV‑2 polyprotein also
found that the highest ex vivo T cell responses were
directed to the NS3 region45.