• Vaccine Name: T. cruzi vaccine encoding pBKTcENO
• Target Pathogen: Trypanosoma cruzi
• Target Disease: Chagas disease
• Type: DNA vaccine
• Status: Research
• Host Species for Licensed Use: None
• Antigen: pBKTcENO (Arce-Fonseca et al., 2018)
• Immunization Route: Intramuscular injection (i.m.)
• Description: A recombinant vaccine encoding pKBTcENO emulsified in PBS (Arce-Fonseca et al., 2018)

Mouse Response

• Host Strain: BALB/c
• Host age: 6-8 weeks
• Host gender: Female
• Vaccination Protocol: All mice (female BALB/c mice 6–8 weeks old) were randomly assigned into control or vaccinated groups of eight mice each. 100 μg of recombinant plasmid (pBKTcENO) or vector DNA (pBK-CMV) (Stratagene) was dissolved in 50 μL of sterile PBS, injected intramuscularly (i.m.) in the tibialis anterioris muscle and boosted twice every 2 weeks. Two weeks after the last immunization, they received an i.p. injection of 8 × 104 bloodstream trypomastigotes of T. cruzi. (Arce-Fonseca et al., 2018)
• Immune Response: The immunizations with pBKTcENO induced a significant production of IgGs against the rTcENO antigen seven days after the last immunization. The mice immunized with pBKTcENO showed IgG2a>IgG2b>IgG1 with an IgG2b/IgG1 ratio > 1, suggesting that a predominantly Th1-like immune response was induced. The pBKTcENO plasmid reduced the parasite load in the mice at 70% and 42% during the parasitemia peak (day 24 after challenge) compared to the PBS and pBK-CMV controls, respectively. All mice immunized with pBKTcENO eventually died, not exceeding day 33 post-infection. (Arce-Fonseca et al., 2018)