Development of a killed but metabolically active anthracis vaccine candidate strain

Fei Shen, Shengling Yuan, Dewen Zhan, Yanchun Wang, Min Ren, Haoxia Tao, Peng Wang, Lingchun Wang, Dongsheng Chen, Chunjie Liu

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1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Anthrax is a zoonosis caused by Bacillus anthracis, which seriously affects human health. In recent years, a special phenomenon is found that the metabolic active of a bacterium remains after it is killed. To development of a KBMA (killed but metabolically active) Bacillus anthracis vaccine candidate strain, a plasmid pMAD and a recombinase system Cre-loxP were used to knockout the uvrAB gene of B. anthracis AP422 which lacks both of two plasmids pXO1 and pXO2. The results of PCR and RT-PCR shows that uvrAB genes were deleted from B. anthracis AP422 chromosome successfully. The constructed B. anthracis AP422△uvrAB was inactivated by photochemical treatment (PCT) including an exposure in a long-wave-length ultraviolet (UVA) light and a treatment of 8-Methoxypsoralen (8-MOP), then the metabolic activity were detected by the method of MTS. The results showed that the killed B. anthracis AP422△uvrAB maintained a highly metabolic activity for at least 4 hours, showing a state of KBMA. The KBMA strain of B. anthracis AP422△uvrAB provides the prospective vaccine candidate strain for anthrax.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)781-789
Number of pages9
JournalShengwu Gongcheng Xuebao/Chinese Journal of Biotechnology
Volume27
Issue number5
StatePublished - May 2011
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • 8-MOP
  • Cre-LoxP system
  • Gene knockout
  • Homologous recombination
  • Long-wave-length ultraviolet (UVA)
  • MTS
  • Metabolically active
  • UvrAB genes

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