Can we better understand how #Zika leads to #microcephaly? A systematic review of the effects of the Zika virus on human #brain #organoids (J Infect Dis., abstract)

[Source: Journal of Infectious Diseases, full page: (LINK). Abstract, edited.]

Can we better understand how Zika leads to microcephaly? A systematic review of the effects of the Zika virus on human brain organoids

Bayu Sutarjono

The Journal of Infectious Diseases, jiy572, https://doi.org/10.1093/infdis/jiy572

Published: 26 September 2018

 

Abstract

Background

The emergence of human brain organoids represents a unique opportunity to better understand the genesis of congenital brain abnormalities, more strikingly microcephaly, caused by the Zika virus (ZIKV) infection during early pregnancy.

Methodology/Results

A systematic review was conducted to investigate how ZIKV leads to microcephaly in a novel experimental model that mimics early brain development. Studies were gathered by searching MEDLINE/Pubmed, LILACS, and LiSSa of the effects of ZIKV infection on human brain organoids. From 146 identified papers, 13 articles were selected for review. In summary, this review found that ZIKV of African, Latin American, and Asian lineages caused productive replication after 72 hours, preferentially infected neural progenitor cells over mature neurons, reduced both cell populations, and caused premature differentiation. Limited data involving only African and Latin American lineages showed a reduction in populations of proliferating cells and intermediate cells, and overall decreased viability. Furthermore, all three lineages caused heightened apoptosis and reduced organoid size.

Conclusion/Significance

This systematic review strengthened the hypothesis that ZIKV causes congenital microcephaly, as investigated in the human brain organoid model. It also demonstrated the coherence of outcomes by these studies to validate the utility of human brain organoids in future research of brain development.

Zika, organoid, microcephaly, neural progenitor cells

Issue Section: Major Article

© The Author(s) 2018. Published by Oxford University Press for the Infectious Diseases Society of America. All rights reserved. For permissions, e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

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Keywords: Zika Virus; Microcephaly; Organoids.

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Giuseppe Michieli

I am an Italian blogger, active since 2005 with main focus on emerging infectious diseases such as avian influenza, SARS, antibiotics resistance, and many other global Health issues. Other fields of interest are: climate change, global warming, geological and biological sciences. My activity consists mainly in collection and analysis of news, public services updates, confronting sources and making decision about what are the 'signals' of an impending crisis (an outbreak, for example). When a signal is detected, I follow traces during the entire course of an event. I started in 2005 my blog ''A TIME'S MEMORY'', now with more than 40,000 posts and 3 millions of web interactions. Subsequently I added an Italian Language blog, then discontinued because of very low traffic and interest. I contributed for seven years to a public forum (FluTrackers.com) in the midst of the Ebola epidemic in West Africa in 2014, I left the site to continue alone my data tracking job.