Preliminary Work Towards Finding Proteins as Potential Vaccine Candidates for Vibrio cholerae Pakistani Isolates through Reverse Vaccinology

Abstract

Background and Objective: Vibrio cholerae continues to emerge as a dangerous pathogen because of increasing resistance to a number of antibiotics. This paper provides a solution to emerging antibiotic resistance by introducing novel proteins as vaccine candidates against cholera. Materials and Methods: Vibrio cholerae genome versatility is a hurdle for developing a vaccine to combat diarrhoeal infection, so its core gene information was used to determine a potential vaccine candidate. Whole genome sequence data of more than 100 Vibrio cholerae strains were used simultaneously to get core genome information. The VacSol pipeline based on reverse vaccinology was selected to address the problem of safe, cheap, temperature-stable, and effective vaccine candidates which can be used for vaccine development against Vibrio cholerae. VacSol screens vaccine candidates using integrated, well-known, and robust algorithms/tools for proteome analysis. The proteomes of the pathogens were initially screened to predict homology using BLASTp. Proteomes that are non-homologous to humans are then subjected to a predictor for localization. Helicer predicts transmembrane helices for the protein. Proteins failing to comply with the set parameters were filtered at each step, and finally, 11 proteins were filtered as vaccine candidates. Results: This selected group of vaccine candidates consists of proteins from almost all structural parts of Vibrio cholerae. Their blast results show that this filtered group includes flagellin A protein, a protein from the Zn transporter system, a lipocarrier outer membrane protein, a peptidoglycan-associated protein, a DNA-binding protein, a chemotaxis protein, a tRNA Pseuriudine synthase A, and two selected proteins, which were beta lactamases. The last two uncharacterized proteins possess 100% similarity to V. albensis and Enterobacter, respectively. Tertiary structure and active site determination show a large number of pockets on each protein. Conclusions: The most interesting finding of this study is that 10 proteins out of 11 filtered proteins are introduced as novel potential vaccine candidates. These novel vaccine candidates can result in the development of cost-effective and broad-spectrum vaccines which can be used in countries where cholera is a major contributor to diarrheal disease.

Molecular detection of Vibrio cholerae from human stool collected from SK Hospital, Mymensingh, and their antibiogram

“…The main reason which is responsible for the occurrence of the expanding resistance is the easy availability of antibiotics and their widespread use in chemoprophylaxis leads resistance mainly through selective pressure apart from other factors [19]. V. cholerae is still considered as a notorious pathogen because of increasing resistance to a number of antibiotics [35]. V. cholera isolated in this study were subjected to antibiogram against nine commonly used antibiotics.…”

High-throughput sequencing in vaccine research

“…Reverse vaccinology may soon become the prescribed countermeasure against antibiotic-resistant pathogens. To this end, Zeb et al (48) created a project to develop vaccines against cholera in the form of new proteins. It is worthwhile not only financially but also and primarily as it strengthens public health protection in countries where cholera causes many cases of diarrhoeal disease (48).…”

“…To this end, Zeb et al (48) created a project to develop vaccines against cholera in the form of new proteins. It is worthwhile not only financially but also and primarily as it strengthens public health protection in countries where cholera causes many cases of diarrhoeal disease (48). The future of immunological science is the generation of vaccines against cancers, global infectious diseases (e.g.…”