title: Vaginal infection of mice with HSV type 2 variant ER-: a new animal model for human primary genital HSV type 2 infections.
abstract: Studying the pathogenesis of vaginal infections in mice with two variants of Herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2) strain ER we observed that both variants ER+ and ER- caused severe vaginitis but only ER+ invaded the CNS leading to lethal neurological disease. In contrast, mice infected with ER- cleared the virus from the vagina and recovered from infection. ER+ and ER- expressed equal levels of thymidine kinase (TK) indicating a TK-independent difference in neurovirulence. Using the non-neurovirulent variant ER-, we were able to investigate humoral immune responses later after infection. Vaginal infection with ER- suppressed serum antibody formation after a secondary systemic HSV-1 infection. Fresh isolates of HSV-1 and HSV-2 caused uniformly a lethal neurological disease after vaginal inoculation of mice. However, some animals survived an intraperitoneal infection with these isolates. Infection with HSV-1 isolates stimulated a strong antibody production, whereas infection with HSV-2 isolates suppressed antibody formation, thus supporting earlier results from our group obtained with laboratory strains. Since suppression of antibody formation could be demonstrated with clinical HSV-2 isolates and likewise after vaginal infection with HSV-2 variant ER- we consider this phenomenon to be of relevance in human genital HSV-2 infections. Vaginal infection of mice with variant ER- represents a new model for primary genital HSV-2 infections; this model could be useful for histopathological, virological, immunological and drug testing studies.
authors.affiliation: Division of Experimental Virology, Johannes Gutenberg-University, Mainz, Germany.
authors.forename: K C
authors.initials: KC
authors.lastname: Wollert
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fleck
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Podlech
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Weise
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Corell
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Falke
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000917:Antibody Formation; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D005260:Female; D006558:Herpes Genitalis / Q000276:immunology* / Q000503:physiopathology; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D008954:Models, Biological; D018139:Simplexvirus / Q000145:classification / Q000302:isolation & purification / Q000472:pathogenicity* / Q000502:physiology; D014621:Vagina / Q000382:microbiology; D014774:Virulence; D014779:Virus Replication