Abstract

Analysis of the Bactericidal Response to an Experimental Neisseria meningitidis Vesicle Vaccine Elizabeth E. Moran a , Robert Burden a , Joseph E. Labrie III a , Zhiyun Wen b , Xin-Min Wang b , Wendell D. Zollinger a , Lan Zhang b and Valerian B. Pinto a a Division of Bacterial and Rickettsial Diseases, Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR), Silver Spring, Maryland, USA b Vaccine Basic Research, Merck Research Laboratories, West Point, Pennsylvania, USA ABSTRACT Rabbit immunogenicity studies on an experimental trivalent native outer membrane vesicle vaccine derived from three serogroup B strains were conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of this vaccine at inducing an antibody response with serum bactericidal activity against meningococcal strains of other serogroups in addition to serogroup B strains. The results showed that the vaccine was capable of inducing an effective broad-based bactericidal antibody response in rabbits against a small sample of Neisseria meningitidis strains of serogroups C, W135, and X and, to a lesser extent, serogroups A and Y. Analysis of antibody specificity using a bactericidal depletion assay revealed that antibodies to lipooligosaccharide (LOS), PorA, and NadA induced in rabbits by the experimental trivalent outer membrane vesicle vaccine were responsible for most of the bactericidal activity against strains of the other N. meningitidis serogroups. In the case of serogroup A N. meningitidis strains, the outer membrane antigen NadA was primarily responsible for protection. The outer membrane antigens fHbp and OpcA were also effective in removing some bactericidal activity from the sera.