Humoral immune response induced by oral administration of S-typhimurium containing a DNA vaccine against porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus

The ORFs-encoded major envelope glycoprotein (GP5) of porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) is one of the major structural proteins of this virus. In this report, we described the induction of a PRRSV GP5-specific immune response by oral vaccination of mice with eukaryotic expression vectors containing the GP5 gene of PRRSV (pcDNA3-GP5), delived by attenuated Salmonella typhimurium aroA. It demonstrated that oral administration of the transformants resulted in expression of the GP5 transcript in the intestinal epithelium. The level of serum neutralization antibodies to PRRSV was not significantly different between the mice immunized with the transformants and the naked plasmid DNA. But the neutralizing antibody titres in sera of the mice immunized with SL7207/pcDNA3-GP5' and pcDNA3-GP5' (resides 2-25 deletion mutant of GP5) were significantly lower than those immunized with the complete GP5 gene. These results show that oral inoculation of the transformants can induce humoral immune response to PRRSV. The signal peptide of the GP5 protein of PRRSV is associated with the neutralizing epitope of the protein. The attenuated S. typhimurium may be used as a delivery system for oral DNA vaccines containing PRRSV GP5 glycoprotein. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.