Human challenge studies are instrumental for testing cholera vaccines, but these studies use outdated strains and require inpatient facilities. Here, we created next-generation isogenic Ogawa and Inaba O1 V. cholerae challenge strains (ZChol strains) derived from a contemporary Zambian clinical isolate representative of current dominant pandemic V. cholerae. Since the primary mechanism of immune protection against cholera is thought to be antibody responses that limit V. cholerae colonization and not the diarrheagenic actions of cholera toxin, these strains were rendered nontoxigenic. In infant mice, the ZChol strains did not cause diarrhea and proved to accurately gauge reduction in intestinal colonization mediated by effective vaccination. ZChol strains were also valuable as targets for measuring vibriocidal antibody responses. Using barcoded ZChol strains, we discovered that vaccination and passive immunity in the infant mouse model tightens the infection bottleneck without restricting pathogen expansion during intestinal infection. Collectively, our findings suggest that ZChol strains have the potential to enhance the safety, relevance, and scope of future cholera vaccine challenge studies and be valuable reagents for studies of immunity to cholera. IMPORTANCE Human challenge studies are a valuable method for testing the efficacy of cholera vaccines. However, challenge studies cannot be performed in countries of cholera endemicity due to safety concerns; also, contemporary pandemic Vibrio cholerae strains are not used in current challenge studies. To facilitate cholera research, we derived nontoxigenic challenge strains of both V. cholerae serotypes from a 2016 clinical isolate from Zambia and demonstrated how they can be used to gauge cholera immunity accurately and safely. These strains were also genetically barcoded, adding the potential for analyses of V. cholerae population dynamics to challenge studies. Preclinical analyses presented here suggest that these strains have the potential to enhance the safety, relevance, and scope of future cholera vaccine challenge studies and be valuable reagents for studies of immunity to cholera.
Keywords: cholera; human challenge; vaccine testing.