Filoviruses, including Ebola virus (EBOV) and Marburg virus (MARV), cause severe hemorrhagic fever in humans and nonhuman primates with high mortality rates. There is no approved therapy against these deadly viruses. Antiviral drug development has been hampered by the requirement of a biosafety level (BSL)-4 facility to handle infectious EBOV and MARV because of their high pathogenicity to humans. In this study, we aimed to establish a surrogate animal model that can be used for anti-EBOV and -MARV drug screening under BSL-2 conditions by focusing on the replication-competent recombinant vesicular stomatitis virus (rVSV) pseudotyped with the envelope glycoprotein (GP) of EBOV (rVSV/EBOV) and MARV (rVSV/MARV), which has been investigated as vaccine candidates and thus widely used in BSL-2 laboratories. We first inoculated mice, rats, and hamsters intraperitoneally with rVSV/EBOV and found that only hamsters showed disease signs and succumbed within 4 days post-infection. Infection with rVSV/MARV also caused lethal infection in hamsters. Both rVSV/EBOV and rVSV/MARV were detected at high titers in multiple organs including the liver, spleen, kidney, and lungs of infected hamsters, indicating acute and systemic infection resulting in fatal outcomes. Therapeutic effects of passive immunization with an anti-EBOV neutralizing antibody were specifically observed in rVSV/EBOV-infected hamsters. Thus, this animal model is expected to be a useful tool to facilitate in vivo screening of anti-filovirus drugs targeting the GP molecule.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/v12090923 | DOI Listing |
Environ Sci Technol
January 2025
Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States.
Enteropathogens are major contributors to mortality and morbidity, particularly in settings with limited access to water, sanitation, and hygiene infrastructure. To assess transmission pathways associated with enteropathogen infection, we measured household environmental conditions and assayed 22 enteropathogens using TaqMan Array Cards in stool samples from 276 six-month-old children living in communities along a rural-urban gradient in Northern Ecuador. We utilized multivariable models, risk factor importance, and distance-based statistical methods to test factors associated with infection.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAdv Sci (Weinh)
January 2025
Department for Functional Materials in Medicine and Dentistry, University Hospital Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany.
Studying the molecular basis of intestinal infections caused by enteric pathogens at the tissue level is challenging, because most human intestinal infection models have limitations, and results obtained from animals may not reflect the human situation. Infections with Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium (STm) have different outcomes between organisms. 3D tissue modeling of primary human material provides alternatives to animal experimentation, but epithelial co-culture with immune cells remains difficult.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFood Funct
January 2025
Nutrition Innovation Centre for Food and Health (NICHE), Ulster University, Coleraine, UK.
Impairment of gut barrier integrity is associated with the pathogenesis of gastrointestinal diseases, including inflammatory bowel disease, colorectal cancer, and coeliac disease. While many aspects of diet have been linked to improved barrier function, (poly)phenols, a broad group of bioactive phytochemicals, are of potential interest. The (poly)phenolic sub-class, flavan-3-ols, have been investigated in some detail owing to their abundance in commonly consumed foods, including grapes, tea, apples, cocoa, berries, and nuts.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHeliyon
January 2025
Centre for Agricultural Genomics and Biotechnology, University of Debrecen, Debrecen, 4032, Hungary.
Heat stress has been proven to cause negative effects on livestock leading to lower productivity and economic value. Understanding how heat stress manifests within an animal's body is the first step in devising a heat stress mitigation strategy; transcriptomic studies are one of the methods used. Here, using a systematic literature review methodology, we examine the recent decade of transcriptomics' application to the study of livestock adaptation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSex Med
December 2024
Department of Clinical Research, University of Southern Denmark, 5000 Odense, Denmark.
Background: Peyronie's disease (PD) is a fibrotic disorder affecting the penile tunica albugínea, with unclear pathophysiology despite centuries of recognition.
Aim: This scoping review maps the effects of interventions in basic PD research, synthesizing evidence from in vivo and in vitro studies to guide future investigation.
Methods: In October-November 2023, a systematic search was conducted across PubMed, Embase (Ovid), Science of Web, and Scopus, following SRYCLE's guidelines.
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