Vaccines in our FOOD????

[Guest guest]

Now We Have a Potato Vaccine in The Wings

For several years, scientists have been trying to

develop vaccines that are delivered through foods such

as potatoes and tomatoes rather than needles.

The hope is that edible vaccines may be more practical

for use in developing countries, since the foods do

not need to be refrigerated as ordinary vaccines must,

and the edible vaccines do not require syringes and

other medical equipment.

So far, plant-based vaccines have met with limited

success.

One problem has been figuring out a way to get edible

vaccines into gut tissues without being destroyed by

digestive juices.

Researchers got past this obstacle by designing a

vaccine around the cholera toxin, which can latch onto

the lining of the gut without being destroyed by

digestive juices. Normally the ability of the toxin to

survive in the gut has harmful consequences, leading

to cholera, but the researchers were able to use the

toxin without causing disease.

Investigators took bits of the cholera toxin and

joined them with proteins, or antigens, from two other

infectious pathogens that invade the gastrointestinal

tract--rotavirus and a strain of E. coli bacteria.

They then developed a genetically modified potato that

contained the triple combination.

The approach seems to work as the investigators found

that female mice that ate the genetically modified

potatoes developed antibodies to all three microbes.

Nature Biotechnology June 2001;19:548-552

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