Zika virus directly infects peripheral neurons and induces cell death

Nature Neuroscience 20, 1209 (2017). doi:10.1038/nn.4612 Authors: Yohan Oh, Feiran Zhang, Yaqing Wang, Emily M Lee, In Young Choi, Hotae Lim, Fahimeh Mirakhori, Ronghua Li, Luoxiu Huang, Tianlei Xu, Hao Wu, Cui Li, Cheng-Feng Qin, Zhexing Wen, Qing-Feng Wu, Hengli Tang, Zhiheng Xu, Peng Jin, Hongjun Song, Guo-li Ming & Gabsang Lee Zika virus (ZIKV) infection is associated with neurological disorders of both the CNS and peripheral nervous systems (PNS), yet few studies have directly examined PNS infection. Here we show that intraperitoneally or intraventricularly injected ZIKV in the mouse can infect and impact peripheral neurons in vivo. Moreover, ZIKV productively infects stem-cell-derived human neural crest cells and peripheral neurons in vitro, leading to increased cell death, transcriptional dysregulation and cell-type-specific molecular pathology.
Source: Nature Neuroscience - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Tags: Brief Communication Source Type: research