Group B Streptococcus Capsular Polysaccharide-Cholera Toxin B Subunit Conjugate Vaccines Prepared by Different Methods for Intranasal Immunization

Group B Streptococcus (GBS) type III capsular polysaccharide (CPS III) was conjugated to recombinant cholera toxin B subunit (rCTB) using three different methods which employed (i) cystamine and N-succinimidyl-3-(2-pyridyldithio)propionate (SPDP), (ii) carbodiimide with adipic acid dihydrazide (ADH) as a spacer, or (iii) reductive amination (RA). The CPS III-rCTB conjugates were divided into large- and small-molecular-weight (M(r)) fractions, and the immunogenicities of the different preparations after intranasal (i.n.) immunization were studied in mice. Both large- and small-M(r) conjugates of CPS III-rCTB(RA) or CPS III-rCTB(ADH) induced high, almost comparable levels of CPS-specific immunoglobulin G (IgG) in serum, lungs, and vagina that were generally superior to those obtained with CPS III-rCTB(SPDP) conjugates or a CPS III and rCTB mixture. However, the smaller-M(r) conjugates of CPS III-rCTB(RA) or CPS III-rCTB(ADH) in most cases elicited a lower anti-CPS IgA immune response than the large-M(r) conjugates, and the highest anti-CPS IgA titers in both tissues and serum were obtained with the large-M(r) CPS III-rCTB(RA) conjugate. Serum IgG anti-CPS titers induced by the CPS III-rCTB(RA) conjugate had high levels of specific IgG1, IgG2a, IgG2b, and IgG3 antibodies. Based on the effectiveness of RA for coupling CPS III to rCTB, RA was also tested for conjugating GBS CPS Ia with rCTB. As for the CPS III-rCTB conjugates, the immunogenicity of CPS Ia was greatly increased by conjugation to rCTB. Intranasal immunization with a combination of CPS Ia-rCTB and CPS III-rCTB conjugates was shown to induce anti-CPS Ia and III immune responses in serum and lungs that were fully comparable with the responses to immunization with the monovalent CPS Ia-rCTB or CPS III-rCTB conjugates. These results suggest that the GBS CPS III-rCTB and CPS Ia-rCTB conjugates prepared by the RA method may be used in bivalent and possibly also in multivalent mucosal GBS conjugate vaccines.