Antisera to selected outer membrane proteins of Vibrio cholerae protect against challenge with homologous and heterologous strains of V-cholerae

Each year cholera epidemics occur in various places around the world. Thoug h there is no effective vaccine against cholera, people who recover from an infection usually have prolonged immunity to the disease. Sera from conval escent patients contain antibodies to a number of outer membrane proteins ( OMPs) of V. cholerae. We isolated several OMPs (43, 42, 30, and 22 kDa) fro m V. cholerae V86 El Tor inaba, sequenced their amino-termini, and generate d hyperimmune sera against them in rabbits. Antisera to the 43-, 42-, and 2 2-kDa OMPs, but not the preimmune sera, significantly reduced V. cholerae-i nduced fluid secretion seen in rabbit intestinal loops challenged with the homologous strain. In addition, a combination of antisera to the different OMPs reduced the fluid secretion induced by challenge with heterologous V. cholerae Ogawa and O139 strains. These results have significance in the dev elopment of vaccines to V. cholerae, as the hyperexpression of these OMP en coding genes in vaccine strains may improve the efficacy of cholera vaccine s. (C) 1998 Federation of European Microbiological Societies. Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.