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ARS Home » Southeast Area » Athens, Georgia » U.S. National Poultry Research Center » Poultry Microbiological Safety and Processing Research Unit » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #327123
Title: Survey of antibodies in broiler sera against salmonella flagellar proteins (flgk and flid)

Author
item Yeh, Hung-Yueh
item ACOSTA, AIMEE - University Of Puerto Rico
item SERRANO, KATHERINE - University Of Puerto Rico

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 3/10/2016
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: none

Technical Abstract: Salmonella is a causative pathogen of human acute bacterial gastroenteritis worldwide. Chickens are regarded as one of major reservoirs of this microorganism. Bacterial flagella are involved in motility, adhesion, quorum sensing and other virulence activities. Also, the flagella are immunogenic. In this communication, we used two Salmonella flagellar proteins - FliD and FlgK as probes to survey the prevalence of Salmonella antibodies in broilers. The fliD and flgK genes were amplified by PCR, and the proteins were over-expressed in an Escherichia coli Expression System. The recombinant proteins were purified by a nickel-chelating affinity chromatography, and confirmed by nucleotide sequencing of the plasmid, SDS-PAGE analysis, and the His tag detection. Sera from the FlgK immunized broilers reacted strongly to FlgK, indicating that this protein is immunogenic. The ELISA results show >85% of broiler sera reacted to FlgK, while about 50% to FliD. The results implicating that these anti-FlgK antibody may be prevalent in the poultry population. These results provide a rationale for further evaluation of these proteins as vaccine candidates for broiler chickens so that food safety for poultry can be improved. These proteins may also hold important insights for Salmonella commensalism in chickens and pathogenesis in humans.