New study to examine neurological effects of West Nile, Zika viruses

A five-year, $7.7 million grant to study the effects of Zika and West Nile virus on the human central nervous system was recently awarded to researchers at Georgia State University, the University of Pennsylvania, and Florida State University.

The three-part study will aim to develop three-dimensional human brain models called organoids. The models will be used to examine parameters of brain infection from neurotropic flaviviruses, screen antiviral compounds, and test various therapeutic approaches.

Both West Nile and Zika are part of the flavivirus family of viruses.

In one part of the study, Margo Brinton of Georgia State University will examine what types of human neural cells can get infected by West Nile virus, how the virus affects both the functions and gene expression of various types of brain cells, and whether factors produced by infected cells can affect uninfected neighboring cells.

“The organoids provide a way to obtain good models of the human brain without using human embryos to obtain the initial cells,” Brinton said. “We have previously used animal models for studying virus infections of the human brain but these models do not accurately duplicate the conditions in human brains.”

Brinton said that the development of brain organoids representing different regions of the brain will help provide more accurate human brain models used to understand the differences between the two viruses that are members of the same virus family, but have very different effects in humans.