Department of Physics and Astronomy, Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, TX, United States.
Department of Physics and Astronomy, Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, TX, United States.
J Theor Biol. 2021 Sep 21;525:110749. doi: 10.1016/j.jtbi.2021.110749. Epub 2021 May 5.
Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a common, contagious infection of the lungs and the respiratory tract. RSV is characterized by syncytia, which are multinuclear cells created by cells that have fused together. We use a mathematical model to study how different assumptions about the viral production and lifespan of syncytia change the resulting infection time course. We find that the effect of syncytia on viral titer is only apparent when the basic reproduction number for infection via syncytia formation is similar to the reproduction number for cell free viral transmission. When syncytia fusion rate is high, we find the presence of syncytia can lead to slowly growing infections if viral production is suppressed in syncytia. Our model provides insight into how the presence of syncytia can affect the time course of a viral infection.
呼吸道合胞病毒（RSV）是一种常见的肺部和呼吸道传染性疾病。RSV 的特征是合胞体，这是由融合在一起的细胞形成的多核细胞。我们使用数学模型来研究关于合胞体的病毒产生和寿命的不同假设如何改变感染的时间进程。我们发现，只有当通过合胞体形成感染的基本繁殖数与无细胞病毒传播的繁殖数相同时，合胞体对病毒滴度的影响才明显。当合胞体融合率较高时，如果合胞体中的病毒产生受到抑制，我们发现合胞体的存在可能导致感染缓慢增长。我们的模型提供了关于合胞体如何影响病毒感染时间进程的见解。
