Publications by authors named "Cristina Santiso-Bellon"

Rotavirus remains a significant public health threat, especially in low-income countries, where it is the leading cause of severe acute childhood gastroenteritis, contributing to over 128,500 deaths annually. Although the introduction of the Rotarix and RotaTeq vaccines in 2006 marked a milestone in reducing mortality rates, approximately 83,158 preventable deaths persisted, showing ongoing challenges in vaccine accessibility and effectiveness. To address these issues, a novel subcutaneous vaccine formulation targeting multiple rotavirus genotypes has been developed.

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Article Synopsis
  • Fecal-orally transmitted gastroenteritis viruses, especially human noroviruses, are a major public health issue linked to contaminated water, but their infectivity has been hard to measure in lab settings.
  • This study tested the human intestinal enteroids (HIE) model to evaluate the infectivity of various gastroenteritis viruses in wastewater, finding that this method efficiently supported viral replication without needing complex sample handling.
  • Of the 28 wastewater samples tested, 57% showed viral replication, with multiple viral types coexisting in some samples, demonstrating the HIE model's effectiveness in identifying infectious gastroenteritis viruses in real-world wastewater.
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Rotavirus (RV) is the leading cause of acute gastroenteritis (AGE) in children under 5 years old worldwide, and several studies have demonstrated that histo-blood group antigens (HBGAs) play a role in its infection process. In the present study, human stool filtrates from patients diagnosed with RV diarrhea (genotyped as P[8]) were used to infect differentiated Caco-2 cells (dCaco-2) to determine whether such viral strains of clinical origin had the ability to replicate in cell cultures displaying HBGAs. The cell culture-adapted human RV Wa model strain (P[8] genotype) was used as a control.

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Human noroviruses (HuNoVs) are the main cause of acute gastroenteritis causing more than 50,000 deaths per year. Recent evidence shows that the gut microbiota plays a key role in enteric virus infectivity. In this context, we tested whether microbiota depletion or microbiota replacement with that of human individuals susceptible to HuNoVs infection could favor viral replication in mice.

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Noroviruses are the leading cause of sporadic cases and outbreaks of viral gastroenteritis. For more than 20 years, most norovirus infections have been caused by the pandemic genotype GII.4, yet recent studies have reported the emergence of recombinant strains in many countries.

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Rotavirus (RV) and norovirus (NoV) are the leading causes of acute gastroenteritis (AGE) worldwide. Several studies have demonstrated that histo-blood group antigens (HBGAs) have a role in NoV and RV infections since their presence on the gut epithelial surfaces is essential for the susceptibility to many NoV and RV genotypes. Polymorphisms in genes that code for enzymes required for HBGAs synthesis lead to secretor or non-secretor and Lewis positive or Lewis negative individuals.

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Article Synopsis
  • - The study explores the challenges of assembling genomes of rapidly mutating viruses, like Norovirus, from samples taken from patients with gastroenteritis, noting the lack of a standardized method for genome sequencing across different patients.
  • - It compared the effectiveness of two assembly tools, SPAdes and MEGAHIT, alongside various preparation strategies, finding that MEGAHIT generally performed better and identified improvements when certain data filtering techniques were applied.
  • - The findings emphasize that the choice of assembly workflow is crucial and can vary significantly based on the specific virus and sample characteristics, highlighting the need for tailored approaches in viral genome assembly.
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Intestinal microbiota-virus-host interaction has emerged as a key factor in mediating enteric virus pathogenicity. With the aim of analyzing whether human gut bacteria improve the inefficient replication of human rotavirus in mice, we performed fecal microbiota transplant (FMT) with healthy infants as donors in antibiotic-treated mice. We showed that a simple antibiotic treatment, irrespective of FMT, resulted in viral shedding for 6 days after challenge with the human rotavirus G1P[8] genotype Wa strain (RVwa).

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Sapovirus is a common cause of acute gastroenteritis in all age groups. Sapovirus infections are seldom investigated in Spain, and its epidemiology in the country is not well known. The use of molecular diagnostic procedures has allowed a more frequent detection of sapoviruses in patients with diarrhea.

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The gut microbiota has emerged as a key factor in the pathogenesis of intestinal viruses, including enteroviruses, noroviruses and rotaviruses (RVs), where stimulatory and inhibitory effects on infectivity have been reported. With the aim of determining whether members of the microbiota interact with RVs during infection, a combination of anti-RV antibody labeling, fluorescence-activated cell sorting and 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing was used to characterize the interaction between specific bacteria and RV in stool samples of children suffering from diarrhea produced by G1P[8] RV. The genera and were identified as RV binders in stools, displaying enrichments between 4.

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The aims of the present work were to determine the prevalence and titer of serum antibodies against several rotavirus VP8* proteins from different P genotypes in children and adults in Valencia, Spain; and to determine the role of the secretor status (FUT2 polymorphism) in the antibody response. The VP8* protein from the P[4], P[6], P[8], P[9], P[11], P[14] and P[25] genotypes were produced in E. coli.

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The aim of the present study was to perform the molecular epidemiology of rotaviruses and noroviruses detected in sewage samples from a large wastewater facility from the city of Valencia, Spain. A total of 46 sewage samples were collected over a one-year period (September 2016 to September 2017). Norovirus and rotavirus were detected and quantified by RT-qPCR, genotyped by semi-nested RT-PCR and further characterized by sequencing and phylogenetic analyses.

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Background: Human group A rotavirus is the leading cause of severe acute gastroenteritis in young children worldwide. Immunization programs have reduced the disease burden in many countries. Vaccination coverage in the Autonomous Region of Valencia, Spain, is around 40%, as the rotavirus vaccine is not funded by the National Health System.

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Rotavirus is the leading agent causing acute gastroenteritis in young children, with the P[8] genotype accounting for more than 80% of infections in humans. The molecular bases for binding of the VP8* domain from P[8] VP4 spike protein to its cellular receptor, the secretory H type-1 antigen (Fuc-α1,2-Gal-β1,3-GlcNAc; H1), and to its precursor lacto-N-biose (Gal-β1,3-GlcNAc; LNB) have been determined. The resolution of P[8] VP8* crystal structures in complex with H1 antigen and LNB and site-directed mutagenesis experiments revealed that both glycans bind to the P[8] VP8* protein through a binding pocket shared with other members of the P[II] genogroup (i.

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Group A rotaviruses are a major cause of acute gastroenteritis in children. The diversity and unequal geographical prevalence of rotavirus genotypes have been linked to histo-blood group antigens (HBGAs) in different human populations. In order to evaluate the role of HBGAs in rotavirus infections in our population, secretor status (FUT2+), ABO blood group, and Lewis antigens were determined in children attended for rotavirus gastroenteritis in Valencia, Spain.

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Human noroviruses are the most common cause of nonbacterial acute gastroenteritis worldwide. We report here the nearly complete genome sequence (7,551 nucleotides) of a human norovirus GII.P17-GII.

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