Curcumin is a promising inhibitor of genotype 2 porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus infection

Taofeng Du,Na Li,En-Min Zhou,Hongtao Zhang,Yuchen Nan,Angke Zhang,Yunpeng Shi,Yani Sun,Shuqi Xiao,Qin Zhao,Yang Mu,Chunyan Wu

doi:10.1186/s12917-017-1218-x

Abstract

BackgroundPorcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) could lead to pandemic diseases and huge financial losses to the swine industry worldwide. Curcumin, a natural compound, has been reported to serve as an entry inhibitor of hepatitis C virus, chikungunya virus and vesicular stomatitis virus. In this study, we investigated the potential effect of curcumin on early stages of PRRSV infection.ResultsCurcumin inhibited infection of Marc-145 cells and porcine alveolar macrophages (PAMs) by four different genotype 2 PRRSV strains, but had no effect on the levels of major PRRSV receptor proteins on Marc-145 cells and PAMs or on PRRSV binding to Marc-145 cells. However, curcumin did block two steps of the PRRSV infection process: virus internalization and virus-mediated cell fusion.ConclusionsOur results suggested that an inhibition of genotype 2 PRRSV infection by curcumin is virus strain-independent, and mainly inhibited by virus internalization and cell fusion mediated by virus. Collectively, these results demonstrate that curcumin holds promise as a new anti-PRRSV drug.

Highlights

Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) could lead to pandemic diseases and huge financial losses to the swine industry worldwide
PRRSV was discovered over twenty years ago, an effective vaccine still has not been developed for the following reasons: (1) Infection of pigs can occur during every phase of production; (2) The semen of boars is a hiding place for virus; (3) The virus is passed between pig farms through multiple routes; (4) High virus mutation frequency is observed; (5) Persistence of infection is observed; (6) Immunosuppression induced by infection prevents virus control [8, 9]; and (7) attenuated PRRSV vaccines can induce weak humoral and cell-mediated immune responses, but have less protection against heterologous strains [10]
Curcumin treatment inhibited PRRSV infection of Marc-145 cells The ability of curcumin to inhibit PRRSV infection was evaluated in Marc-145 cells by detection of PRRSV N protein and virus production

Summary

Introduction

Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) could lead to pandemic diseases and huge financial losses to the swine industry worldwide. We investigated the potential effect of curcumin on early stages of PRRSV infection. Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS), a serious pandemic disease, causes huge economic losses to the swine industry. The etiological agent, PRRS virus (PRRSV), is an enveloped single-stranded positive-sense RNA virus belonging to the Arteriviridae family [3]. PRRSV strains belong to two major genotypes, the European (type 1) and North American (type 2) genotypes, with distinct genetic profiles and geographic distributions [4,5,6]. Development of new antiviral drugs or vaccine adjuvants is needed to control PRRSV

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion