About the Authors

Rita Melo

Affiliation Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Biochemistry, College of Medicine, University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, Memphis, Tennessee, United States of America

Luciana Richer

Affiliation Immuno Technologies Inc., Memphis, Tennessee, United States of America

Daniel L. Johnson

Affiliation Molecular Resource Center, University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, Memphis, Tennessee, United States of America

Maria Gomes-Solecki

mgomesso@uthsc.edu

Affiliations Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Biochemistry, College of Medicine, University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, Memphis, Tennessee, United States of America, Immuno Technologies Inc., Memphis, Tennessee, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have the following interests: Luciana Richer and Maria Gomes-Solecki are employed by Immuno Technologies, Inc. MGS holds more than 5% financial interest in Immuno Technologies, Inc. and in US Biologic, Inc. LR holds 5% financial interest in Immuno Technologies, Inc. MGS advises US Biologic on development of reservoir targeted vaccines for Lyme borreliosis. MGS holds several relevant patents (Recombinant constructs of Borrelia burgdorferi, US 7,605,248; Groups of Borrelia burgdorferi and Borrelia afzelii that cause Lyme Disease in humans, US 7,582,304; Oral vaccine for Borrelia, US 2009/0297560 A1). This did not alter the authors' adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: RM LR MGS. Performed the experiments: RM DLJ LR. Analyzed the data: RM DLJ MGS. Wrote the paper: MGS.