Abstract
Rainbow trout fry syndrome (RTFS) is a disease caused by the Gram-negative bacterium Flavobacterium psychrophilum, responsible for significant economic losses in salmonid aquaculture worldwide. The diversity of F. psychrophilum isolates and the inherent difficulties in vaccinating juvenile fish has hampered the development of a vaccine for RTFS. Disease episodes tend to occur between 10–14 °C with necrotic lesions often seen on the skin surrounding the dorsal fin and tail. At present no commercial vaccines are available for RTFS in the UK, leaving antibiotics as the only course of action to control disease outbreaks. The current work was performed as a pilot study to assess the efficacy of a polyvalent, whole cell vaccine containing formalin-inactivated F. psychrophilum, to induce protective immunity in rainbow trout fry. Duplicate groups of 30 trout (5 g) were immersed in 1 L of the vaccine for 30 s. Samples were taken 4 h, day 2 and 7 post-vaccination (pv) of skin mucus, tissues for histology and gene expression analysis; serum and histology samples were taken 6 weeks pv. A booster vaccination was given at 315 degree days (dd) also by immersion. Challenge was by immersion with a heterologous isolate of F. psychrophilum 630 dd post primary vaccination. The vaccine provided significant protection to the trout fry with a RPS of 84% (p < 0.0001). Detection of increased numbers of IgT positive cells in systemic organs, up-regulation of IgT expression in hind-gut and an increase in total IgT in serum was observed in vaccinated fish; however a functional role of IgT in the observed protection remains to be demonstrated.
Highlights
Rainbow trout fry syndrome (RTFS) caused by Flavobacterium psychrophilum is one of the most significant disease problems facing the aquaculture industry worldwide, with infections of salmonids reported in Europe, North America, Australia, Chile, Peru, Japan, Korea [1]
As RTFS affects salmonid fry when they are too small to vaccinate by injection, oral and immersion vaccination allows the only option for mass delivery of a vaccine to provide protection for the fish as early as possible
Fish were challenged with F. psychrophilum isolate AVU-1T/07 (1 × 108 colony forming units (CFU) mL−1) 630 degree days post primary vaccination
Summary
Rainbow trout fry syndrome (RTFS) caused by Flavobacterium psychrophilum is one of the most significant disease problems facing the aquaculture industry worldwide, with infections of salmonids reported in Europe, North America, Australia, Chile, Peru, Japan, Korea [1]. Flavobacterium psychrophilum is a highly heterogeneous pathogen and a limited number of commercial vaccines are currently available (Chile, Norway) to counteract this devastating disease which are not suitable for juvenile fish [2]. As RTFS affects salmonid fry when they are too small to vaccinate by injection, oral and immersion vaccination allows the only option for mass delivery of a vaccine to provide protection for the fish as early as possible. The expression of immunoglobulin isotypes in response to immersion vaccination of rainbow trout weighing 35 g to live attenuated F. psychrophilum was investigated [6], while studies on vaccinated fry, especially using inactivated whole cell vaccines, are. Existing immersion and oral vaccines for Yersinia ruckeri and Vibrio anguillarum have demonstrated the minimum size of the onset of adaptive immunity in salmonids tends to be between 0.5 and 2.5 g [7] suggesting that it should be possible to stimulate immunity in salmonid fry against F. psychrophilum by these vaccination methods
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