Persistent inflammation and neuronal loss in the mouse brain induced by a modified form of attenuated herpes simplex virus type I

Herpes simplex virus-1(HSV-1)is a widespread neurotropic virus that can reach the brain and cause a rare but acute herpes simplex encephalitis(HSE)with a high mortality rate.Most patients present with changes in neurological and behavioral status,and survivors suffer long-term neurological sequelae.To date,the pathogenesis leading to brain damage is still not well understood.HSV-1 induced encephalitis in the central nervous system(CNS)in animals are usually very diffuse and progressing rapidly,and mostly fatal,making the analysis difficult.Here,we established a mouse model of HSE via intracerebral inoculation of modified version of neuralattenuated strains of HSV-1(deletion of ICP34.5 and inserting a strong promoter into the latency-associated transcript region),in which the LMR-αΔpA strain initiated moderate productive infection,leading to strong host immune and inflammatory response characterized by persistent microglia activation.This viral replication activity and prolonged inflammatory response activated signaling pathways in neuronal damage,amyloidosis,Alzheimer's disease,and neurodegeneration,eventually leading to neuronal loss and behavioral changes characterized by hypokinesia.Our study reveals detailed pathogenic processes and persistent inflammatory responses in the CNS and provides a controlled,mild and non-lethal HSE model for studying long-term neuronal injury and increased risk of neurodegenerative diseases due to HSV-1 infection.

The pulse vaccination effects in mammary carcinoma

Induction of antitumor immunity by vaccination is one of the major current immunother- apy strategies. We present a mathematical model of the competition between immune cells and mammary carcinogenesis under the effect of Triplex vaccine. The model describes both humoral and cell-mediated immune responses against cancer cells. The control of the cancer cells growth occurs through the application of the pulse vaccination. Here we determine the relationship between the strength of the vaccine and the time required to eradicate cancer cells, and we present some simulations to illustrate our theoretical results, namely, the total cancer cells depletion, which is influenced by competition occurs among the immune and cancer cells.