norovirus tagged posts

A class of viruses known to cause severe diarrheal diseases – including the one famous for widespread outbreaks on cruise ships – can grow in the salivary glands of mice and spread through their saliva, scientists at the National Institutes of Health have discovered. The findings show that a new route of transmission exists for these common viruses, which afflict billions of people each year worldwide and can be deadly.

The transmission of these so-called enteric viruses through saliva suggests that coughing, talking, sneezing, sharing food and utensils, and even kissing all have the potential for spreading the viruses. The new findings still need to be confirmed in human studies.

The findings, which appear in the journal Nature, could lead to better ways to prevent, diagnos...

Left, the P domain on human norovirus attaches to human cells via binding to HBGA. Human IgA antibody 5I2 interferes with this attachment by physically blocking the HBGA recognition site on the P domain. Courtesy of S. Shanker, B.V.V. Prasad and M. Estes

A mechanism by which human antibodies target and block noroviruses has been found. It opens the possibility of developing therapeutic agents against this virus that causes the death of about 200,000 children every year. “Some people infected with norovirus do not get sick,” said Dr. B V Venkataram Prasad, professor of virology and the Alvin Romansky Chair in biochemistry at Baylor. “We wanted to understand how
these protective human antibodies work.”

The researchers screened and isolated protective antibodies from human blood and discovere...