PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Mosquito virus could lead to new vaccines and drugs

Although closely related to deadly pathogens, newly discovered Eilat virus is harmless and potentially valuable

2012-09-21
(Press-News.org) A mosquito sample collected three decades ago in Israel's Negev Desert has yielded an unexpected discovery: a previously unknown virus that's closely related to some of the world's most dangerous mosquito-borne pathogens but, curiously, incapable of infecting non-insect hosts.

Researchers believe this attribute could make the Eilat virus a uniquely useful tool for studying other alphaviruses, a genus of largely mosquito-borne pathogens that includes the viruses responsible for chikungunya, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, western equine encephalitis and eastern equine encephalitis. In addition, the researchers say, Eilat could also aid in the development of new alphavirus vaccines, therapies and diagnostic techniques.

"This virus is unique — it's related to all of these mosquito-borne viruses that cause disease and cycle between mosquitoes and animals, and yet it is incapable of infecting vertebrate cells," said University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston graduate student Farooq Nasar, lead author of a paper on the virus now online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "It's a gift, really, because we can compare it to other alphaviruses and figure out the basis of their ability to infect a variety of animals, including humans."

Eilat was discovered in a virus sample that Joseph Peleg of Hebrew University sent to UTMB's Dr. Robert Tesh, an author of the PNAS paper and director of the World Reference Center for Emerging Viruses and Arboviruses. The collection holds over 5,000 identified viruses and dozens of unidentified samples like the one contributed by Peleg.

All the researchers knew about Peleg's specimen was that it killed insect cells while leaving animal cells untouched, a very unusual behavior. So they sent it to a lab at Columbia University that specializes in doing highly intensive searches for the genetic material of viruses, a process called "deep sequencing." As it turned out, there were two new viruses in the sample. One virus killed insect cells, and the other — Eilat virus — infected them without doing any harm.

"We were extraordinarily lucky to have that other virus in our sample, because without the cell death it caused, we never would have done the work that led us to Eilat," Nasar said. "Essentially, we found it by accident."

Eilat's inability to grow in animal cells — even its genetic material cannot replicate in them — makes it unique among alphaviruses, and it also makes it likely that the virus could be uniquely valuable to researchers who study alphaviruses and work to protect humans and domestic animals from them. For example, the UTMB researchers say, Eilat could be transformed into a vaccine against one of its dangerous relatives by making changes to the genes that produce its envelope proteins, which are exposed on virus particle surfaces and stimulate the critical parts of the immune response.

"We have taken the genes for the envelope proteins of very dangerous viruses like eastern equine encephalitis and used them to replace the genes for Eilat's structural proteins," Nasar said. "That gives us viruses that we can grow in insect cells that can't do anything in vertebrate cells at all, but still produce immunity against eastern equine encephalitis —they can be used to vaccinate animals, and hopefully someday people."

A variety of Eilat-based "chimeric viruses" — viruses made by combining genetic material from other viruses — could be used to study the interactions between host cells and dangerous alphaviruses, leading to the development of antiviral drugs. The viruses could also serve as the basis for new diagnostic tools that could be deployed in an alphavirus outbreak. Because these chimeras, like Eilat, would not be able to infect vertebrates, such research could be done without the elaborate and often cumbersome containment precautions needed for working with pathogens like chikungunya, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, or eastern and western equine encephalitis.

### Other authors of the PNAS paper include research associates Rodion Gorchakov, Hilda Guzman and Amelia Travassos Da Rosa, assistant professor Michael Sherman, and professors Vsevolod Popov and senior author Scott Weaver, as well as Columbia University's Gustavo Palacios, Nazir Savji and Ian Lipkin. This research was supported by the National Institutes of Health.


ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

New turtle tracking technique may aid efforts to save loggerhead

New turtle tracking technique may aid efforts to save loggerhead
2012-09-21
The old adage "you are what you eat" is helping scientists better understand the threatened loggerhead turtle, which is the primary nester on Central Florida's beaches. A study published today in the journal PLOS ONE describes how scientists at the University of Central Florida used a technique that links chemical signatures of the turtles' diets and their watery environments to their migratory routes. They found the technique just as effective as expensive satellite tracking. Little is known about the turtles, which spend 99 percent of their time in the water and return ...

Solving the stink from sewers

2012-09-21
The rotten egg gas leaking from sewer pipes and costing billions of dollars worldwide in odour control may soon be far less of a problem thanks to new research discussed at the 2012 International Water Association (IWA) conference this week. Trials with a magic mix of chemicals, called Cloevis, on sewers in the Gold Coast region in Australia stopped 99 per cent of the rotten egg gas or hydrogen sulphide emitted from these pipes. Lead researcher, Professor Zhiguo Yuan from the University of Queensland, told IWA delegates that one week after dosing for a few hours, in ...

Researchers develop new 'stamping' process to pattern biomolecules at high resolution

2012-09-21
Fabricating precise biomolecular structures at extremely small scales is critical to the progress of nanotechnology and related fields. Traditionally, one of the ways this has been accomplished has been through the use of rubber stamps with tiny features — similar to those used by children in play, but detailed at the microscopic scale — which are covered with molecular "inks" and then stamped onto substrate surfaces, creating a molecular patterns. But when using this technique at the nanoscale, molecules tend to diffuse on the surface both during and after stamping, ...

Advancing the treatment of trauma

2012-09-21
With traumatic injuries claiming almost six million lives a year, improvements in care, including in the challenging areas of brain and bone injuries, and haemorrhage, are urgently needed. Leading medical journal The Lancet today published a series led by researchers and clinicians from the National Trauma Research Institute (NTRI), a collaboration between Monash University and Alfred Health, which notes the difficulties and charts the progress in improving three critical areas of trauma care. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is the leading cause of trauma-related deaths ...

'Kick-starting' male fertility

2012-09-21
Adding a missing protein to infertile human sperm can 'kick-start' its ability to fertilise an egg and dramatically increase the chances of a successful pregnancy, a team of Cardiff University scientists have uncovered. The team from Cardiff University's School of Medicine first found that sperm transfers a vital protein, known as PLC-zeta (PLCz), to the egg upon fertilisation. This sperm protein initiates a process called 'egg activation' which sets off all the biological processes necessary for development of an embryo. Now, the team has found that eggs that don't ...

Nunavut's mysterious ancient life could return by 2100

Nunavuts mysterious ancient life could return by 2100
2012-09-21
This press release is available in French.Global climate change means that recently discovered ancient forests in Canada's extreme north could one day return, according to Alexandre Guertin-Pasquier of the University of Montreal's Department of Geography, who is presenting his findings at the Canadian Paleontology Conference in Toronto today. "According to the data model, climate conditions on Bylot Island will be able to support the kinds of trees we find in the fossilized forest that currently exist there, such as willow, pine and spruce. I've also found evidence of ...

Nudge or think: What works best for our society?

2012-09-21
If approached in the right way, citizens are willing to change their behaviour and do more to help themselves and others, according to research funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The project, carried out jointly at the universities of Manchester and Southampton, experimented with different interventions techniqueswhich encourage citizen participation and explored people's motivations for community involvement. The researchers focused on comparing the effectiveness of 'nudge' techniques, where people are offered incentives to change their behaviour, ...

Research blog: An expedition to the Earth's fiery heart

2012-09-21
Volcanic activity on and around La Réunion is driven by a localized upwelling of hot buoyant magma. Unlike most magma sources, this is not located on the boundary between two tectonic plates, and rises from much greater depths. It is a so-called hotspot, and has left behind on the overlying mobile crust a track of volcanic activity that stretches 5500 km northwards to the Deccan Plateau in India. Some 65 million years ago, in a process that had a massive impact on world climate, the Deccan area was covered with enormous amounts of lava as the Indian Plate passed over the ...

New challenges for ex-Olympians

2012-09-21
When elite-level athletes retire, they often struggle to adapt to their new lives. When finding that the characteristics that were valuable in sport are not equally useful in 'ordinary' life, they often start experiencing disorientation, depression, self-doubt or even illness. This is concluded in research from the University of Gothenburg. Successful athletes at the elite level develop characteristics that should generate success also later in life. However, this notion may be wrong, according to the new research. As part of a study, ex-Olympians from Sweden, Switzerland, ...

23 nuclear power plants are in tsunami risk areas

23 nuclear power plants are in tsunami risk areas
2012-09-21
The tsunami in Japan in March 2011 unleashed a series of negligence related with the resulting nuclear disaster. A scientific study headed by Spanish researchers has for the first time identified those atomic power plants that are more prone to suffering the effects of a tsunami. In total, 23 plants are in dangerous areas, including Fukushima I, with 74 reactors located in the east and southeast of Asia. Tsunamis are synonymous with the destruction of cities and homes and since the Japanese coast was devastated in March 2011 we now know that they cause nuclear disaster, ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Warming temperatures impact immune performance of wild monkeys, U-M study shows

Fine particulate air pollution may play a role in adverse birth outcomes

Sea anemone study shows how animals stay ‘in shape’

KIER unveils catalyst innovations for sustainable turquoise hydrogen solutions

Bacteria ditch tags to dodge antibiotics

New insights in plant response to high temperatures and drought

Strategies for safe and equitable access to water: a catalyst for global peace and security

CNIO opens up new research pathways against paediatric cancer Ewing sarcoma by discovering mechanisms that make it more aggressive

Disease severity staging system for NOTCH3-associated small vessel disease, including CADASIL

Satellite evidence bolsters case that climate change caused mass elephant die-off

Unique killer whale pod may have acquired special skills to hunt the world’s largest fish

Emory-led Lancet review highlights racial disparities in sudden cardiac arrest and death among athletes

A new approach to predicting malaria drug resistance

Coral adaptation unlikely to keep pace with global warming

Bioinspired droplet-based systems herald a new era in biocompatible devices

A fossil first: Scientists find 1.5-million-year-old footprints of two different species of human ancestors at same spot

The key to “climate smart” agriculture might be through its value chain

These hibernating squirrels could use a drink—but don’t feel the thirst

New footprints offer evidence of co-existing hominid species 1.5 million years ago

Moral outrage helps misinformation spread through social media

U-M, multinational team of scientists reveal structural link for initiation of protein synthesis in bacteria

New paper calls for harnessing agrifood value chains to help farmers be climate-smart

Preschool education: A key to supporting allophone children

CNIC scientists discover a key mechanism in fat cells that protects the body against energetic excess

Chemical replacement of TNT explosive more harmful to plants, study shows

Scientists reveal possible role of iron sulfides in creating life in terrestrial hot springs

Hormone therapy affects the metabolic health of transgender individuals

Survey of 12 European countries reveals the best and worst for smoke-free homes

First new treatment for asthma attacks in 50 years

Certain HRT tablets linked to increased heart disease and blood clot risk

[Press-News.org] Mosquito virus could lead to new vaccines and drugs
Although closely related to deadly pathogens, newly discovered Eilat virus is harmless and potentially valuable