Julia Nogueira Varela, Mário Sérvulo Izidoro Jr, Luciana Maria de Hollanda and Marcelo Lancellotti
Haemophilus influenzae and Neisseria meningitis are gram negative, commensal bacteria naturally present in the nasopharynx. They are also naturally competent and suffer genetic mutations. H. influenzae causes diseases such as otitis media and pneumonia. While N. meningitis causes pneumonia, meningitis and sepsis. With the introduction of a vaccination program, a decrease in cases and deaths caused by these pathogens were observed over the following years. Especially, in countries where these vaccines were included in the vaccination schedule and in endemic regions, such as the meningitis belt in Africa. However, there are serotypes, biotypes and strains that these vaccines do not cover. Thus, these strains, biotypes and serotypes are emerging as pathogenic ones. Concerning the health authorities because the diagnosis of these diseases is most of the times unreliable and treatment needs to be immediate, due to the rapid evolution of the disease. For these emerging bacteria novel immunogenic targets are being researched as a way of trying to find and design new vaccines. These vaccines can be aimed in membrane proteins. Using these proteins as immunogenic targets with the help of adjuvants, to boost the immune system. The burden of a death or sequel to children and even adults that undergo meningitis infection and treatment is high. Therefore prevention is the best alternative. The aim of this review is to present this novel targets and their pros and cons. As a way of enlighten researches to view this new group of molecules and ligands as a possible target.