Differential Immune Responses to New World and Old World Mammalian Arenaviruses.

Hinh Ly

doi:10.3390/ijms18051040

Abstract

Some New World (NW) and Old World (OW) mammalian arenaviruses are emerging, zoonotic viruses that can cause lethal hemorrhagic fever (HF) infections in humans. While these are closely related RNA viruses, the infected hosts appear to mount different types of immune responses against them. Lassa virus (LASV) infection, for example, results in suppressed immune function in progressive disease stage, whereas patients infected with Junín virus (JUNV) develop overt pro-inflammatory cytokine production. These viruses have also evolved different molecular strategies to evade host immune recognition and activation. This paper summarizes current progress in understanding the differential immune responses to pathogenic arenaviruses and how the information can be exploited toward the development of vaccines against them.

Highlights

Arenaviruses are single-stranded ambisense RNA viruses that are divided into Old World (OW) and New World (NW) viruses based on their phylogenetic, serological, and geographical differences
Lassa virus (LASV) and Lujo virus (LUJV) are OW viruses found in Africa, and Junín virus (JUNV) and the other NW arenaviruses found in South America (Table 1) can cause severe and sometimes fatal hemorrhagic fever (HF) infections
While the OW and NW arenaviruses share many characteristics, differences do exist when it comes to how the infected hosts respond to their infections immunologically

Summary

Introduction

Arenaviruses are single-stranded ambisense RNA viruses that are divided into Old World (OW) and New World (NW) viruses based on their phylogenetic, serological, and geographical differences. Lassa virus (LASV) and Lujo virus (LUJV) are OW viruses found in Africa, and Junín virus (JUNV) and the other NW arenaviruses found in South America (Table 1) can cause severe and sometimes fatal hemorrhagic fever (HF) infections. Unlike LASV-infected patients, those infected with the NW arenavirus JUNV showed elevated levels of cytokine expressions, such as TNFα, IFNα, IL-6, and IL-10 [32,33,34].

Results

Conclusion