Testing of the Biocan® B inj. ad us. vet. vaccine and development of the new recombinant vaccine against canine borreliosis

Abstract

Verification of the efficacy of Biocan B inj. ad us. vet. (Bioveta, a.s.) was done by challenge testing. Ticks collected in the nature were used as natural vectors of the infection. Six beagles and two control ones were used in the test. Formation of outer surface protein A specific antibodies (OspA antibodies) and borrelia specific immonoglobulins (IgG) was measured by Western blot and EIA in the sera samples. The tissue samples were used for detection of borreliae by cultivation method and dark field microscopy (DFM). Formation of IgG antibodies and OspA antibodies after vaccination was observed. The maximum titer level of antibodies was reached between 21. and 49. day after vaccination and then slowly decreased. Presence of borreliae was detected only in skin biopsies of non-vaccinated dogs. The post mortem tissue samples showed presence of borreliae in all of the samples of the non-vaccinated dogs. The tissues of the vaccinated dogs were not infected with borreliae, except for two samples of dog with low titer levels of OspA antibodies. The development of the new vaccine is based on preparation of recombinant outer surface proteins (e.g. rOspA and rOspC) of B. afzelii, B. burgdorferi and B. garinii origin. Chosen recombinant proteins were successfully expressed in E. coli. The obtained purified proteins are currently being tested on laboratory BALB/c mice. Formation of specific antibodies against some recombinant proteins has been confirmed. These proteins are suitable candidates for preparation of a vaccine prototype and they will be subsequently used in challenge tests.

Prevention of Lyme Disease: Promising Research or Sisyphean Task?

“…Vaccines based on inactivated bacteria tested in dogs are commercially available (Merilym, Merial, Germany; LymeVax, Fort Dodge, USA; Galaxy Lyme, Shering Plough, USA; Biocan B, Bioveta, Czech Republic). Subunit vaccines based on recombinant (Recombitek Lyme, Merial, USA) OspA or OspA purified from Borrelia extract (ProLyme, Intervet, USA) were also licensed for dog vaccination (Chu et al 1992;Levy 2002;Marconi and Earnhart 2010;Tuhackova et al 2005;Wiedemann and Milward 1999;Wikle et al 2006). These vaccines target only narrow spectrum of strains and need frequent revaccination (Topfer and Straubinger 2007).…”

Functionalised Nanoliposomes for Construction of Recombinant Vaccines: Lyme Disease as an Example

“…Three are formulations of B. burgdorferi bacterin (Merilym, Merial, Germany; Galaxy Lyme, Schering Plough, USA; LymeVax, Fort Dodge, USA). A European vaccine based on combination of bacterins from B. garinii and B. afzelii is produced for dogs (Biocan, Bioveta, Czech Republic) [ 24 ]. There are also available veterinary subunit vaccines based on recombinant OspC antigen (ProLyme, Intervet, USA; Recombitek Lyme, Merial, USA).…”