A transmission electron micrograph image of the Zika virusCDCThe race is on to develop animal models for Zika. The latest mouse model, developed by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, mimics features of Zika virus infection in humans, including accumulation of the pathogen in the brain, spinal cord, and testes, the researchers reported in a study published today (April 5) in Cell Host & Microbe.
“Now that we know the mice can be vulnerable to Zika infection, we can use the animals to test vaccines and therapeutics—and some of those studies are already underway—as well as to understand the pathogenesis of the virus,” study coauthor Michael Diamond, a professor of medicine at Washington University, said in a statement.
To develop this model, study coauthor Helen Lazear—now at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill—and colleagues tested five strains of the virus, including the first-isolated strain from Uganda in 1947, three strains from an outbreak in Senegal in the 1980s, and a strain from the 2013 outbreak in French Polynesia.
Lazear’s team infected mice that had been genetically modified to not produce an immune system signaling molecule, interferon. The infected animals ...
