Cui Jiannan, Zhao Yongkun, Wang Hualei, Qiu Boning, Cao Zengguo, Li Qian, Zhang Yanbo, Yan Feihu, Jin Hongli, Wang Tiecheng, Sun Weiyang, Feng Na, Gao Yuwei, Sun Jing, Wang Yanqun, Perlman Stanley, Zhao Jincun, Yang Songtao, Xia Xianzhu
College of Veterinary Medicine, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin 150030, China.
Institute of Military Veterinary, Academy of Military Medical Sciences, Changchun 130122, China.
Viruses. 2016 Dec 18;8(12):332. doi: 10.3390/v8120332.
West Nile virus (WNV) is prevalent in Africa, Europe, the Middle East, West Asia, and North America, and causes epidemic encephalitis. To date, no effective therapy for WNV infection has been developed; therefore, there is urgent need to find an efficient method to prevent WNV disease. In this study, we prepared and evaluated the protective efficacy of immune serum IgG and pepsin-digested F(ab')₂ fragments from horses immunized with the WNV virus-like particles (VLP) expressing the WNV M and E proteins. Immune equine F(ab')₂ fragments and immune horse sera efficiently neutralized WNV infection in tissue culture. The passive transfer of equine immune antibodies significantly accelerated the virus clearance in the spleens and brains of WNV infected mice, and reduced mortality. Thus, equine immunoglobulin or equine neutralizing F(ab')₂ passive immunotherapy is a potential strategy for the prophylactic or therapeutic treatment of patients infected with WNV.
西尼罗河病毒（WNV）在非洲、欧洲、中东、西亚和北美流行，并引起流行性脑炎。迄今为止，尚未开发出针对WNV感染的有效疗法；因此，迫切需要找到一种有效的方法来预防WNV疾病。在本研究中，我们制备并评估了用表达WNV M和E蛋白的WNV病毒样颗粒（VLP）免疫的马的免疫血清IgG和胃蛋白酶消化的F(ab')₂片段的保护效果。免疫马F(ab')₂片段和免疫马血清在组织培养中有效地中和了WNV感染。马免疫抗体的被动转移显著加速了WNV感染小鼠脾脏和大脑中的病毒清除，并降低了死亡率。因此，马免疫球蛋白或马中和F(ab')₂被动免疫疗法是对WNV感染患者进行预防性或治疗性治疗的潜在策略。
