The University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine

eorgia Veterinary Scholars Program

GVSP Summer 2008 Scholars

Georgia Veterinary Scholar	Faculty Mentor

Koren Moore University of Georgia Class of 2011	Dr. Ralph Tripp

Aerosol exposure as a method of vaccination against influenza virus.

Koren Moore*. Humberd, Jennifer; Nagy, Tamas; Tripp, Ralph. University of Georgia, College of Veterinary Medicine. Athens, Georgia.

Influenza A viruses cause emerging zoonotic disease affecting animals and humans worldwide. Vaccination is important in preventing infection; however, genetic features of the virus and the use of vaccines that do not confer effective protection result in the selection of the antigenically divergent strains compromising the value of vaccination. Thus, new vaccination strategies focusing on aerosol vaccine delivery are being developed to impart inductive immunity at the site of influenza virus replication. This research examined two methods of
delivery of influenza virus and compared the effects of different anesthetics on influenza virus replication. In these studies, virus was administered by aerosol exposure or intranasal droplets in a mouse model of infection using either an inhaled anesthetic or intraperitoneal injection of a sedative, Avertin. Mice infected via aerosol exposure showed lower virus titers in lungs after sedation with isoflurane (less than 101 TCID50/ml) compared to mice sedated with Avertin (106.4 TCID50/ml). A time-course study comparing aerosol and intranasal virus delivery modes showed that aerosol delivery produced highest virus titers overall, where for each delivery mode and in both sample types collected (lungs and nasal washes), viral replication peaked at day 3 post infection. Histopathological review of lung specimens determined that aerosol infection resulted in more severe pulmonary lesions compared to intranasal inoculation. Because influenza vaccines contain attenuated virus rather than the wild-type virus that was used in this research, aerosolization should be a superior method for vaccine delivery of attenuated vaccines.

Research Support: Tripp Laboratory, Animal Health Research Center
Student Support: NIH - 5 T35 RR022685