Development of a simple killed enterotoxigenic E. coli vaccine for weaned pigs

Enterotoxigenic Escherictia coli causes diarrhea (E. coli scours) in young weaned pigs. There currently are no licensed killed vaccines for the disease, and the available living vaccines do not express toxins which should be a major target of a vaccine. This lack of toxin antigens may affect how well the vaccines protect pigs. We have recently developed an experimental killed vaccine for pig strains of E. coli that completely protects the animals from K88+ E. coli. However, the product would be too cumbersome to mass manufacture and to expensive to use in commercial swine production. The purpose of this current project is to utilize the knowledge gained from developing the experimental vaccine to create a simpler and less expensive product that would have commercial value, and to test that product for safety, potency and effectiveness in protecting weaned pigs from experimental challenge with highly virulent K88+ enterotoxigenic E. coli.