Transmission routes of African swine fever virus to domestic pigs: current knowledge and future research directions.

African swine fever (ASF) is a major threat to the pig industry in Europe. Since 2007, ASF outbreaks have been ongoing in the Caucasus, Eastern Europe and the Baltic countries, causing severe economic losses for many pig farmers and pork producers. In addition, the number of ASF cases in wild boar populations has dramatically increased over the past few years.

BacMam Platform for Vaccine Antigen Delivery.

Recombinant baculo viruses based on Autographa californica multiple nuclear polyhedrosis virus carrying vertebrate cell active expression cassettes, so-called BacMam viruses, are increasingly used as gene delivery vectors for vaccination of animals against pathogens. Different approaches for generation of BacMams exist and a variety of transfer vectors to improve target protein expression in vivo have been constructed. Here we describe a use of transfer vector which contains an insect cell-restricted expression cassette for the green fluorescent protein and thus enables easy monitoring of BacMam virus rescue, fast plaque purification of recombinants and their convenient titer determination and which has been proven to be efficacious for gene delivery in vaccination/challenge experiments.

Membrane and inclusion body targeting of lyssavirus matrix proteins.

Lyssavirus matrix proteins (M) support virus budding and have accessory functions that may contribute to host cell manipulation and adaptation to specific hosts. Here, we show that rabies virus (RABV) and European Bat Lyssavirus Type 1 (EBLV-1) M proteins differ in targeting and accumulation at cellular membranes. In contrast to RABV M, EBLV-1 M expressed from authentic EBLV-1 or chimeric RABV accumulated at the Golgi apparatus.

Intergenotypic replacement of lyssavirus matrix proteins demonstrates the role of lyssavirus M proteins in intracellular virus accumulation.

Lyssavirus assembly depends on the matrix protein (M). We compared lyssavirus M proteins from different genotypes for their ability to support assembly and egress of genotype 1 rabies virus (RABV). Transcomplementation of M-deficient RABV with M from European bat lyssavirus (EBLV) types 1 and 2 reduced the release of infectious virus.