Attenuated maturation-defective chlamydia vaccines
AssigneeRutgers, The State University of New Jersey
InventorHuizhou FAN
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Abstract
Using a novel dependence on plasmid-mediated expression (DOPE) technology, conditional depletion of GrgA, a Chlamydia-specific protein, has been demonstrated to result in greatly reduced reticulate body (RB) proliferation rate and near complete lack of elementary body (EB) formation, thus disrupting the normal chlamydial developmental cycle. This conditional GrgA-deficient Chlamydia allows study of chlamydial growth and developmental regulation and can be used as the basis of an attenuated, maturation-defective but immunogenic bacteria for use as an avirulent vaccine against Chlamydia.
Claims8
A Chlamydia knock-out that does not express GrgA.
A method of determining whether a bacterial gene in a bacterial cell is essential to its growth or development, comprising:
- (a) determining the growth or development of the bacterial cell when the gene is intact and expressed;
- (b) disrupting the gene and determining the growth or development of the bacterial cell when the gene is not functional;
- (c) introducing into the bacterial cell with the bacterial gene disrupted, a plasmid that contains an inducible version of the bacterial gene and determining the growth or development of the bacterial cell when the bacterial gene is induced and when the bacterial gene is not induced.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.