Bird to human transmission biases and vaccine escape mutants in H5N1 infections.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The avian influenza A H5N1 virus occasionally infects humans, with high mortality rates. Although all current human infections are from avian-to-human transmission, it has been shown that H5N1 can be evolved to transmit between mammals, and is therefore a pandemic threat. For H5N1 surveillance, it is of interest to identify the avian isolates most likely to infect humans. In this study, we develop a method to identify mutations significantly associated with avian to human transmission.

Method

Using protein sequences for the surface glycoprotein hemagglutinin from avian and human H5N1 isolates in China, Egypt, and Indonesia from the years 1996-2011, we used Principle Component Analysis and a Maximum Likelihood Multinomial method to identify mutations associated wit

SUBMITTER: Wagh K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4079711 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature