Simian varicella virus DNA in dorsal root ganglia.
Clinical, pathological, immunological, and virological evidence suggests that simian varicella virus (SVV) infection of primates is the counterpart of varicella-zoster virus infection of humans. To determine whether these two viruses share similarities in their properties during latency, we analyzed ganglia and brain of an African green monkey experimentally infected with SVV for the presence of viral nucleic acid using the polymerase chain reaction technique. We detected SVV DNA in dorsal root ganglia but not in brain of this monkey, which demonstrated no apparent clinical signs of SVV infection. Our results suggest that SVV becomes latent in monkey ganglia and that latency can develop in the absence of clinical varicella (chickenpox). These studies provide an animal model system to study varicella virus latency.
Mahalingam
R
R
Department of Neurology, University of Colorado Health Sciences Center, Denver 80262.
Smith
D
D
Wellish
M
M
Wolf
W
W
Dueland
A N
AN
Cohrs
R
R
Soike
K
K
Gilden
D
D
D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D002522:Chlorocebus aethiops; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D004279:DNA, Viral / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D004901:Erythrocebus patas; D005260:Female; D005727:Ganglia, Spinal / Q000382:microbiology*; D014645:Herpesvirus 3, Human / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D015345:Oligonucleotide Probes; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods; D015183:Restriction Mapping
D004279:DNA, Viral; D015345:Oligonucleotide Probes