ABSTRACT
A subset of infants dying suddenly and unexpectedly have myocarditis with or without pericarditis found at autopsy. To address whether viruses known to cause infantile myocarditis and pericarditis might be present in such infants, we examined myocardium, liver and skeletal muscle for the presence of genomic sequences from adenovirus, cytomegalovirus, enterovirus and echovirus 22/23 in infants enrolled in a comprehensive evaluation protocol. We studied eight infants who died suddenly and unexpectedly with histologic evidence of myocarditis and/or pericarditis detected at postmortem examination. One infant with myocarditis and pericarditis had adenovirus genome detected in the myocardium. In an additional infant with severe pericarditis alone, enterovirus genome was detected in the liver. Although echovirus 22/23 has been associated with myopericarditis in young infants, no previous studies have used molecular methods to search for the genomic sequences of these viruses in clinical samples. No echovirus 22/23 genome was detected in the patients reported here. The significance of enterovirus and adenovirus genome in the tissues of two patients dying suddenly and unexpectedly remains speculative but raises the possibility that pathogenic viruses may cause little or no clinical symptoms and yet be contributory to sudden death in young infants.
Subject(s)
Myocarditis/complications , Pericarditis/complications , Sudden Infant Death/etiology , Virus Diseases/complications , Adenoviridae/isolation & purification , Autopsy , Base Sequence , Culture Techniques , Cytomegalovirus/isolation & purification , DNA Primers , Enterovirus/isolation & purification , Female , Humans , Infant , Infant, Newborn , Male , Molecular Sequence Data , Myocarditis/pathology , Myocarditis/virology , Pericarditis/pathology , Pericarditis/virology , Polymerase Chain Reaction , Retrospective Studies , Sudden Infant Death/pathology , Virus Diseases/pathologyABSTRACT
Limb regeneration is a unique developmental phenomenon restricted to certain urodeles in which limb cells dedifferentiate and produce the blastema and then redifferentiate into the tissues that compose the missing part. Genetic modification of the blastema cells would greatly facilitate understanding the programmed gene expression that results in the reconstitution of the limb. To test whether pantropic retroviral vectors pseudotyped with the vesicular stomatitis virus G glycoprotein could mediate gene transfer into blastema cells, we infected a stable newt limb cell line and demonstrated integration and expression of the provirus. Thus, pantropic retroviral vectors offer a new tool for the study of limb regeneration and other developmental phenomena in amphibia.
Subject(s)
Gene Transfer Techniques , Genetic Vectors , Regeneration , Retroviridae/genetics , Virus Integration , Animals , Base Sequence , Cell Line , Cells, Cultured , DNA Primers , Extremities , Humans , Molecular Sequence Data , Retroviridae/physiology , SalamandridaeABSTRACT
Understanding the pathogenesis of viral myocarditis is linked to the availability of sensitive assays to detect viruses in clinical material. Recent advances in molecular techniques permit direct detection of viral-specific nucleic acid in tissue samples. This report describes a protocol for DNA extraction and amplification of adenovirus genome from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded human tissues that detects as little as 10 copies of viral genome in a background of 0.5 micrograms of human DNA. This sensitive assay permitted the examination of archived tissues to establish a retrospective diagnosis of adenoviral myocarditis in two pediatric patients.
