ALPHA-HERPESVIRUS TRANSPORT IN AXONS

神经侵袭性疱疹病毒从感觉神经元传播到眼睛、大脑或从母亲传播到新生儿，是导致发病率和死亡率的重要原因。单纯疱疹病毒1型(HSV-1)和伪狂犬病病毒(PRV)是哺乳动物神经侵袭性疱疹病毒(单纯疱疹病毒和水痘病毒)两个属中具有代表性的成员。这些病毒依赖于传播到神经系统来建立终身潜伏感染，但对这一显著特征背后的神经入侵机制知之甚少。我们建议研究病毒的神经侵袭机制，目的是：(I)破译这些病毒是如何入侵神经系统的，(Ii)了解这些病毒逃避神经感染的内在障碍，以及(Iii)产生和表征缺乏神经侵袭特性的病毒作为潜在的疫苗。这些研究旨在破译病毒策略，用于确定神经感染和我们相应的神经系统防御系统，以阻止大多数病原体。

Spread of neuroinvasive herpesviruses from sensory neurons to the eye, brain or from mother to newborn, are significant causes of morbidity and mortality. Herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) and pseudorabies virus (PRV) are representative members of the two genuses of mammalian neuroinvasive herpesviruses (Simplexviruses & Varicelloviruses). These viruses are dependent upon spread to the nervous system to establish life-long latent infections, yet very little is known regarding the neuroinvasive mechanism that underlies this remarkable trait. We propose to study the virus neuroinvasive machinery with the intent to: (i) decipher how these viruses invade the nervous system, (ii) understand the intrinsic barriers to neural infection that these viruses evade, and (iii) produce and characterize viruses lacking the neuroinvasive property as potential vaccines. These studies are designed to decode the virus tactics used to establish neural infections and our corresponding nervous system’s defenses that keep most pathogens at bay.