An outbreak of hand, foot, and mouth disease in China has lead to 41,000 infections and 18 deaths this year. What is this disease and what causes it? Hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) is a rather common viral infection of children. There were 80,000 recorded cases of the disease just in China for 2007. …
Viral replication frequently leads to the accumulation of intracellular masses of virions or unassembled viral components in the cytoplasm or nucleus of the cell. These inclusion bodies often bear the name of the individual who discovered them – such as Guarnieri bodies in the cytoplasm of poxvirus infected cells, intranuclear Cowdry bodies in herpesvirus infected …
I joined host Dr. Marc Pelletier on the TWiT podcast ‘Futures in Biotech’ to interview influenza virologist Dr. Peter Palese, professor and chair of microbiology at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York. We talk about influenza and why Dr. Palese revived a virus that killed 50 million people. Download Futures in Biotech 40: Virus Reborn …
Last week on TWiV #26 Rich Condit and I were reminiscing about the possibility that we had received the virus SV40 along with our polio immunizations. That discussion prompted me to examine my immunization record for poliovaccine that my Mother had given to me in the early 1990s. She was cleaning out her house and …
Learning vaccinology from an immunization record Read More »
On episode #26 of the podcast “This Week in Virology”, Vincent, Alan, and Rich Condit converse about induction of polyomavirus replication in multiple sclerosis patients treated with the MS drug Tysabri, the extent of human polyomavirus infection, selection of influenza vaccines for the 2009-10 season, cowpox virus transmission from animals to humans, vaccinia-like virus infecting …
While immunosuppressive therapy can ameliorate a variety of diseases, one unfortunate side effect of the treatment is that it may lead to pathogenic infections by viruses which would otherwise be benign. An example is the brain infection PML which occurs when immunosuppression leads to replication of the polyomavirus JC. How many polyomaviruses do we have …
