Identification and immunological characteristics of chaperonin GroEL in Riemerella anatipestifer

Riemerella anatipestifer (RA) infections cause major economic losses in the duck industry. In this study, an immunogenic protein, chaperonin GroEL (GroEL), was identified from the outer membrane of RA strain WJ4 by immunoproteomic assay based on matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time of flight mass spectrometry. The complete sequence of the encoding gene, chaperonin groEL (groEL) was amplified and determined to be 1,629 base pairs in length. groEL was then cloned into expression vector pGEX-6P-1, and the expression of the recombinant GroEL (rGroEL) in Escherichia coli strain BL21 was confirmed by sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and Western blotting analysis. Immunization assay showed that ducklings or rabbits immunized with purified rGroEL generated 53- or 160-fold more anti-GroEL antibodies than those with no immunization. Importantly, bactericidal assay showed that rabbit anti-GroEL serum killed 30.0-57.3% of bacteria representing different serotypes, while rabbit anti-bacterin serum killing activity exhibits large serotype-dependent variations between 0.2% and 63.6%. Animal challenge experiment showed that ducklings immunized with rGroEL were 50%, 37.5%, and 37.5% protected from the challenge with RA strains WJ4 (serotype 1), Th4 (serotype 2), and YXb-2 (serotype 10), respectively. In addition, groEL from 34 additional RA strains was amplified by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), and products from nine were sequenced. groEL is highly conserved among RA strains, as the DNA sequence identity was over 97.5% between WJ4 and the nine additional strains. Our results suggest that GroEL may be a good candidate for new RA vaccine development.