Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Ritter, Marcus
• Bouloy, Michele
• Vialat, Pierre
• Janzen, Christian
• Haller, Otto
• Frese, Michael

Titel

Resistance to Rift Valley fever virus in Rattus norvegicus: genetic variability within certain 'inbred' strains

Ist Teil von

• Journal of general virology, 2000-11, Vol.81 (11), p.2683-2688

Ort / Verlag

England: Soc General Microbiol

Erscheinungsjahr

2000

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Abteilung Virologie, Institut für Medizinische Mikrobiologie und Hygiene, Universität Freiburg, Hermann-Herder-Str. 11, D-79104 Freiburg, Germany 1 Groupe des Bunyaviridés, Unité des Arbovirus et Virus des Fièvres Hèmorragiques, Institut Pasteur, 25 Rue du Dr Roux, 75724 Paris, France 2 Author for correspondence: Michael Frese. Fax +49 761 203 6626. e-mail frese{at}ukl.uni-freiburg.de Rift Valley fever virus (RVFV) is the causative agent of Rift Valley fever, a widespread disease of domestic animals and humans in sub-Saharan Africa. Laboratory rats have frequently been used as an animal model for studying the pathogenesis of Rift Valley fever. It is shown here that Lewis rats (LEW/mol) are susceptible to infection with RVFV, whereas Wistar–Furth (WF/mol) rats are resistant to RVFV infection. LEW/mol rats developed acute hepatitis and died after infection with RVFV strain ZH548, whereas WF/mol rats survived the infection. Cross-breeding of resistant WF/mol rats with susceptible LEW/mol rats demonstrated that resistance is segregated as a single dominant gene. Primary hepatocytes but not glial cells from WF/mol rats showed the resistant phenotype in cell culture, indicating that resistance was cell type-specific. Moreover, when cultured hepatocytes were stimulated with interferon (IFN) type I there was no indication of a regulatory role of IFN in the RVFV-resistance gene expression in WF/mol rats. Interestingly, previous reports have shown that LEW rats from a different breeding stock (LEW/mai) are resistant to RVFV infections, whereas WF/mai rats are susceptible. Thus, inbred rat strains seem to differ in virus susceptibility depending on their breeding histories. A better genetic characterization of inbred rat strains and a revision in nomenclature is needed to improve animal experimentation in the future.