Background And Aims: Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the major cause of lower respiratory tract infections in children and the elderly, often progressing to pneumonia and severe sequelae. However, there are currently no feasible and cost-effective interventions with proven efficacy for children, making medications with anti-RSV activity urgently needed. Traditional Chinese medicine has shown promising therapeutic efficacy in alleviating viral infection symptoms.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFClassical swine fever (CSF) and porcine epidemic diarrhea (PED) are highly contagious viral diseases that pose a significant threat to piglets and cause substantial economic losses in the global swine industry. Therefore, the development of a bivalent vaccine capable of targeting both CSF and PED simultaneously is crucial. In this study, we genetically engineered a recombinant classical swine fever virus (rCSFV) expressing the antigenic domains of the porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV) based on the modified infectious cDNA clone of the vaccine strain C-strain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTo develop the new classical swine fever (CSF) vaccine candidate with differentiating infected vaccinated animals (DIVA) characteristics, a chimeric CSF virus (CSFV) was constructed based on an infectious cDNA clone of the CSF vaccine C-strain. The 5'- and 3'-untranslated regions (UTRs) and partial E2 region (residues 690-860) of the C-strain were substituted with the corresponding regions of bovine viral diarrhoea virus (BVDV) to construct the chimeric cDNA clone pC/bUTRs-tE2. The chimeric virus rC/bUTRs-tE2 was generated by several passages of pC/bUTRs-tE2-transfected PK15 cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRespiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a serious respiratory pathogen in infants and young children worldwide. Currently, no licensed RSV vaccines are available. In this study, we explored stable prefusion conformation virus-like particles (Pre-F VLPs) as RSV vaccine candidates.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Classical swine fever (CSF) virus is the causative agent of an economically important, highly contagious disease of pigs. CSFV is genetically and serologically related to bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV). BVDV infection in pigs can mimic CSF clinical signs, which cause difficulty in differentiation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe E2 glycoprotein of classical swine fever virus (CSFV) plays multiple roles in the viral life cycle. The chimeric live attenuated C strain with the E2 substitution of bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) is a promising marker vaccine candidate. In this study, the recombinant chimeric CSFV/bE2 cDNA clone harboring heterologous E2 (bE2) of BVDV was constructed by genetic approaches.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPatients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) often exhibit diverse disease progressions associated with various infectious ability, symptoms, and clinical treatments. To systematically and thoroughly understand the heterogeneous progression of COVID-19, we developed a multi-scale computational model to quantitatively understand the heterogeneous progression of COVID-19 patients infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)-like coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2). The model consists of intracellular viral dynamics, multicellular infection process, and immune responses, and was formulated using a combination of differential equations and stochastic modeling.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe 3'untranslated region (3'UTR) and NS5B of classical swine fever virus (CSFV) play vital roles in viral genome replication. In this study, two chimeric viruses, vC/SM3'UTR and vC/b3'UTR, with 3'UTR substitution of CSFV Shimen strain or bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) NADL strain, were constructed based on the infectious cDNA clone of CSFV vaccine C strain, respectively. After virus rescue, each recombinant chimeric virus was subjected to continuous passages in PK-15 cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRespiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the major cause of lower respiratory tract infections in children. Inactivated RSV vaccine was developed in the late 1960's, but the vaccine-enhanced disease (VED) occurred to vaccinated infants upon subsequent natural RSV infection. The excessive inflammatory immunopathology in the lungs might be involved in the VED, but the underlying mechanisms remain not fully understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHand-foot-and-mouth disease (HFMD) is an infectious disease of infants and young children frequently caused by the enterovirus A species, mainly enterovirus 71 (EV71) and coxsackievirus A16 (CA16). In this study, we prepared the EV71 virus-like particle (EV71-VLP) and its chimeras using recombinant baculovirus (Bac-P1-3CD) co-expressing EV71 P1 (under polyhedrin promoter) and 3CD (under CMV-IE promoter) proteins in Sf9 cells. EV71-VLP chimera ChiEV71(1E)-VLP or ChiEV71(4E)-VLP displayed single CA16 PEP71 epitope in VP1 or four conserved CA16 neutralizing epitopes (PEP71 in VP1, aa136-150 in VP2, aa176-190 in VP3 and aa48-62 in VP4) by substitution of the corresponding regions of EV71 structure proteins, respectively.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRespiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection causes severe disease in the lower respiratory tract of infants and young children. Currently, no licensed vaccine is available. In this study, we generated the chimeric virus-like particles (tHBc/F, tHBc/F/M2 and tHBc/F/M2/tG VLPs) containing multiple antigenic peptides of RSV proteins based on a truncated hepatitis B virus core carrier (tHBc).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPestivirus nonstructural protein 3 (NS3) is a multifunctional protein with protease and helicase activities that are essential for virus replication. In this study, we used a combination of biochemical and genetic approaches to investigate the relationship between a positively charged patch on the protease module and NS3 function. The surface patch is composed of four basic residues, R50, K74 and K94 in the NS3 protease domain and H24 in the structurally integrated cofactor NS4A.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSalmonella Pullorum is a pathogen specific to birds that can cause Pullorum disease in young chickens and lead to considerable economic losses in the poultry industry. During transmission and infection, S. Pullorum will encounter various environmental stresses and host defenses.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Salmonella is an important zoonotic pathogen, and chickens are one of its main hosts. Every year, Salmonella infections pose a serious threat to the poultry industry in developing countries, especially China. In this study, a total of 84 Salmonella isolates recovered from sick and healthy-looking chickens in central China were characterized by serotyping, MLST-based strain typing, presence of potential virulence factors, and antimicrobial resistance profiles.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe influenza A virus (IAV) ribonucleoprotein (vRNP) complex consists of polymerase subunits, nucleoprotein (NP) and viral RNA and is responsible for RNA transcription and replication. Interactions between the vRNP complex and host factors play important roles in virus replication, pathogenicity and species tropism. In this study, Strep-tag affinity purification coupled with mass spectrometry was used to identify host factors that interact with IAV vRNP complex in infected human cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRespiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the most important cause of lower respiratory tract infection in infants and young children. The vaccine-enhanced disease (VED) has greatly hindered the development of an RSV vaccine. Currently, there are no licensed vaccines for RSV.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNewcastle disease virus (NDV) has been used as a vector in the development of vaccines and gene delivery. In the present study, we generated the thermostable recombinant NDV (rNDV) expressing the different forms of hemagglutinin (HA) of highly pathogenic avian influenza virus (HPAIV) H5N1 based on the full-length cDNA clone of thermostable TS09-C strain. The recombinant thermostable Newcastle disease viruses, rTS-HA, rTS-HA1 and rTS-tPAs/HA1, expressed the HA, HA1 or modified HA1 protein with the tissue plasminogen activator signal sequence (tPAs), respectively.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAccumulated evidence demonstrates that Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) infection triggers endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress and neuron apoptosis. ER stress sensor protein kinase R-like endoplasmic reticulum kinase (PERK) has been reported to induce apoptosis under acute or prolonged ER stress. However, the precise role of PERK in JEV-induced apoptosis and encephalitis remains unknown.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA multiplex reverse transcription polymerase chain rection (mRT-PCR) was developed for simultaneous detection of four RNA viruses in swine. The conserved target sequences directed to classical swine fever virus (CSFV), porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV), porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV) and transmissible gastroenteritis coronavirus (TGEV) were selected based on alignments of genomic sequences and then specific primers were designed. The mRT-PCR assay was developed and evaluated for its specificity and sensitivity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJapanese encephalitis virus (JEV) infection induces brain tissue disease characterized by neuron death. however, little is known about the underlying mechanism. Using RNA sequencing, we profiled global mRNA expression changes in response to in vitro and in vivo JEV infection.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHuman enterovirus 71 (EV71) and coxsackievirus A16 (CA16) are the two major causative agents of hand-foot-and-mouth disease (HFMD). To investigate novel combined vaccines to prevent EV71 and CA16 infection, we constructed chimeric virus-like particles (tHBc/SPA or tHBc/SP VLPs) displaying conserved epitopes of EV71 (aa 208-222 of VP1 and aa 248-263 of VP2) and CA16 (aa271-285 of VP1) using a truncated hepatitis B virus core carrier (tHBc). Immunization with the chimeric VLPs induced epitope- or virus-specific IgG and neutralization antibodies against EV71 and CA16 in the mice.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe classical swine fever virus (CSFV) nonstructural protein p7 is crucial for virus production, yet precisely how the p7 modulates this process is unclear. In this study, we first identified the interactions of p7 with E2 and NS2. The key binding regions of both p7 and NS2 mapped to the first transmembrane (TM1) domain of two proteins.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe nonstructural protein NS3 from the family is a multifunctional protein that contains an N-terminal protease and a C-terminal helicase, playing essential roles in viral polyprotein processing and genome replication. Here we report a full-length crystal structure of the classical swine fever virus (CSFV) NS3 in complex with its NS4A protease cofactor segment (PCS) at a 2.35-Å resolution.
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