An immune stress test for resilience to aging: Pneumococcal vaccine response

Abstract

The idea that the degree of response to physical stress in early life can be used to measure health in later life is a novel approach to better define resilience to aging. To investigate this, middle-age (15 months) mice were stressed by vaccination with a commercial pneumococcal vaccine (Prevnar 13), and 30 days later separated into a high antibody response group and a low antibody response group using Elisa to detect IgG serum antibody levels. After 4 months, mice were evaluated for physiological performance and learning ability. The high antibody response group was able to stay on a rotating rod longer than the low antibody response group and were more quickly able to find the escape hole in a spatial navigation learning task. This observation suggests Prevnar 13 antibody response in midlife could be a useful stress test to predict healthy aging.

Keywords: Resilience to aging; aging mice; elisa antibody titers; immune stress test; prevnar 13 vaccine.

Figure 1.

Mice injected subcutaneously with a 1:10 dilution of Prevnar 13 vaccine could be separated into high and low responders based on strength of Elisa antibody levels 30 days after vaccination, N = 25. The cutoff between high and low responders was 0.562 absorbance.

Figure 2.

High Prevnar 13 antibody response mice showed an increased run time on the rotating rod test compared to the low antibody response group, N = 8–10 per cohort, P ≤ 0.05.

Figure 3.

High Prevnar 13 antibody response mice showed a lower R2 slope for escape times in the box maze compared to the low antibody response group, N = 8–10 per cohort. P ≤ 0.05 for trial 3.