Live vaccines more effective against Salmonella

Researchers at Cambridge University have effectively ‘barcoded’ the bacteria so that they can see where in the body they go and how they fare against the immune system. Vaccines against Salmonella that use a live, but weakened, form of the bacteria are more effective than those that use only dead fragments because of the particular way in which they stimulate the immune system, according to research from the University of Cambridge published last week. The BBSRC-funded researchers used a new technique that they have developed where several populations of bacteria, each of which has been individually tagged with a unique DNA sequence, are administered to the same host (in this case, a mouse). This allows the researchers to track how each bacterial population replicates and spreads between organs or is killed by the immune system. Combined with mathematical modelling, this provides a powerful tool to study infections within the host. The findings...