Mouse hepatitis virus and herpes simplex virus move along different CNS pathways.

The spread of mouse hepatitis virus, strain JHM and herpes simplex virus type 1 in the central nervous system after inoculation into the nares and main olfactory bulb has been examined. The results show that each virus infects a subset of the possible connections of the olfactory bulb and that the subset infected by each virus is different. Thus, both viruses will be useful for studying the neuroanatomic connections of the olfactory bulb, and possibly for functional analyses as well.