Zika virus triggers autophagy to exploit host lipid metabolism and drive viral replication.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Zika virus (ZIKV), an arbovirus of global concern, has been associated with neurological complications including microcephaly in newborns and Guillain-Barré syndrome in adults. Like other flaviviruses, ZIKV depends on cholesterol to facilitate its replication; thus, cholesterol has been proposed as a therapeutic target to treat the infection using FDA-approved statins. Cholesterol is stored in intracellular lipid droplets (LD) in the form of cholesterol esters and can be regulated by autophagy. We hypothesize that the virus hijacks autophagy machinery as an early step to increase the formation of LD and viral replication, and that interference with this pathway will limit reproduction of virus.

Methods

We pretreated MDCK cells with atorvastatin or other inhibitors

SUBMITTER: Stoyanova G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10199480 | biostudies-literature | 2023 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature