Correlation of antibody titres induced by vaccination with protection in mouse typhoid

The ELISA method was used to titrate the humoral immune response in vaccinated mice. When mice were given two doses of a heat-killed salmonella vaccine 6 days apart, there was a steady but low-level increase of antibody synthesis. In contrast, if a booster vaccination was administered 21 days after the primary inoculation, the anamnestic response produced a significantly greater antibody titre, rapidly reaching its peak within 10 days. Such a heightened humoral response induced in the genetically susceptible C57BL/6J mice also coincided with effective protection against an otherwise lethal challenge with Salmonella typhimurium.