Measles virus (MV) infection of the human central nervous system (CNS) typically involves widespread infection of neurons. However, little is known about how they become infected, how defective virus arises and accumulates, or how virus spreads among the cells of the CNS. In vitro studies of viral interactions with human neuronal cells may contribute to the resolution of such issues. In mixed c...

Application of neutralizing anti-hemagglutinin antibodies to mouse neuroblastoma cells (NS20Y/MS) persistently infected with measles virus (MV) leads to a significant reduction of viral structural proteins within 6 days. While the transcriptional gradient for MV-specific mRNAs remained unaffected upon antibody treatment, the total amount of MV-specific transcripts dropped by 80% after 24 h. The...

Measles virus (MV) infection is re-emerging, despite the availability of an effective vaccine. The mechanism of MV entry into a target cell relies on coordinated action between the MV hemagglutinin (H) receptor binding protein and the fusion envelope glycoprotein (F) which mediates fusion between the viral and cell membranes. Peptides derived from the C-terminal heptad repeat (HRC) of F can int...

Measles virus (MV) is a member of the Morbillivirus genus in the Paramyxoviridae family. Human signaling lymphocyte activation molecule (SLAM) acts as a cellular receptor for MV. SLAM is expressed on immature thymocytes, activated lymphocytes, macrophages and mature dendritic cells. This distribution of SLAM is in accord with lymphotropism and immunosuppressive nature of MV. Canine distemper an...

A rapid and sensitive one-step reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction assay was developed to detect measles virus (MV) in nasal aspirates from patients with suspected MV infection. Oligonucleotide primers and probe were targeted to highly conserved regions of the matrix gene. Assay conditions were optimized to allow detection of as little as 1 PFU of an MV stock whose titer was known. ...

In spite of active measles virus (MV) vaccination strategies, reemergence continues to occur, impairing global eradication programs. The immune status against measles was evaluated in 350 vaccinated healthy Argentine children and teenagers who received a single dose of the MV Schwarz strain Lirugen vaccine (Aventis Pasteur). Sera were assessed for immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies by a commerci...

As a result of successful implementation of the measles/rubella elimination program, the etiology of more and more double negative cases remains elusive. The present study determined the role of different viruses as causative agents in measles or rubella suspected cases in Belarus. A total of 856 sera sent to the WHO National Laboratory between 2009 and 2011 were tested for specific IgM antibod...

D iverse mechanisms are used by viruses to inhibit, block, or evade the immune response (see review in reference 1). These include reduced expression of critical antigenic epitopes (e.g., EBV in latency), genetic variation of class I–restricted CTL epitopes (HIV-1), clonal exhaustion of CTLs (HIV-1, lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus), downregulation of MHC class I and peptide–MHC complex expre...

Attenuated measles virus (MV) is currently being evaluated as an oncolytic virus in clinical trials and could represent a new therapeutic approach for malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM). Herein, we screened the sensitivity to MV infection and replication of twenty-two human MPM cell lines and some healthy primary cells. We show that MV replicates in fifteen of the twenty-two MPM cell lines. D...

CD46 downregulation by measles virus (MV) occurs after expression of virus haemagglutinin (H) protein on the surface of the infected cell and is a consequence of CD46-H interaction on the cell membrane. To assess whether CD46 downregulation also occurs after CD46-H interaction when these two molecules are expressed on distinct cells, we used human T cell line Jurkat (expressing CD46) and transf...