Thesis (M.Sc.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Pharmacy - Department of Analytical Chemistry

Meningococcal meningitis is a serious infection of the meninges that affects the brain membrane. Neisseria meningitidis is a potential cause to large epidemics. Meningococcal polysaccharide vaccines are available in either bivalent (A and C) or tetravalent (A, C, Y and W135). In this work, many tests were carried out to ensure safety, efficacy and quality of meningococcal AC vaccine. This was achieved through qualitative and quantitative tests as follows; vaccine vial monitor (VVM) grade is a screening testing for validity of vaccine. Polysaccharide content test is a quantitative test to determine the quantity of each serogroup. In this work polysaccharide content of polysaccharide A (PSA) will take only one day instead of two days. Molecular size distribution (MSD) is a quantitative test for the stability. It was done by using one of three proposed methods (Individual fractions method, pooling method and ELISA method). The proposed chromatographic conditions save about 7.5 hours, compared with the official method. Pooling method is easier to handle, faster, simpler, less expensive, safe, more accurate, and applicable, because of two pools were used for testing instead of using a large numbers of individual fractions test tubes, its calculations were based on calibration curve and linear equation with more accurate results, it is saving the expensive reference and reagents used in the analysis

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