**Coronaviruses as Encephalitis - Inducing Infectious Agents**

Pierre J. Talbot, Marc Desforges, Elodie Brison and Hélène Jacomy *Laboratory of Neuroimmunovirology, INRS-Institut Armand-Frappier, Laval (Québec) Canada* 

#### **1. Introduction**

184 Non-Flavivirus Encephalitis

Sidhu M.S., Husar W., Cook S.D.,, Dowling P.C., & Udem S. (1993) Canine Distemper

Sidhu M.S., Crowley J, Lowenthal A. Karchen D.Mennona J.,Cook S, Udem S. & Dowling P.

SleemanK., Stein D.A., Tamin A., Reddish M.,Iversen P.L., & Rota P.A. (2009) Inhibition of

Souraud J.B., Faivre a., Waku-KouomouD., Gaillard T., Aouad N., Meaudre E., Wild F.T., &

Tatli B.,Ekici B. & Ozmen M. (2010) Flupirtine may stop the progressive course of subacute

Titomanlio L., Soyah N., Guerin V., Delante C., Sterkers G. Evrard P. & Husson I. (2007) Rituximab in subacute sclerosing panencehalitis. Eur J Paediatr Neurol, 11, 43-45. Torisu H., Kusuhara k., Kira R., Bassuny W.M., Sakai Y., Sanefugi M., Takemoto M., & Hara

Toro-Riera M., Macaya-Ruiz A., Raspall-Chaure M., Tallada-Serra M., Pasqual-Lopez I. &

with Interferon alpha and intraventricular ribavirin. Rev Neurol 42,277-281. Toth A.M., Li Z,, Cattaneo R., & Samuel C.E.(2009) RNA-specific adenosine deaminase

Trottier C., Colombo M., Mann K., Miller W., & Ward B.J. (2009) Retinoids inhibit measles virus through a type 1 IFN-dependent bystander effect. Faseb J , 80, 45-53. Ward S.V., George C.X., Welch M.J., Liou L.Y., Hahm B., Lewicky H., de la Torre J.C.,

Watanabe A., Yoneda M., IkedaF., Terao-Muto Y., Sato H. & Kai C. (2010)

Wong T.C., Ayata M., Hirano A., Yoshikawa Y., Tsruoka H, & Yamanouchi K. (1989)

World Health Organization (2006) Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety. (1-2

Yagita h., Takeda K., Hayakawa Y., Smyth M.J., & Okumura k. (2004) TRAIL and its

Young V.A, & Rall G.F. (2009) Making it to the Synapse: Measles virus Spread in and

Zinke M., Kendl S., Singethan K., Fehrholz M., Reuter D., Rennick L., Herold M.J., &

receptors as targets for cancer therapy. Cance Sci ,95, 777-783.

and Oldstone M.B.A., Springer, Berlin, CTMI, 330, 3-30.

molecular studies-a case report. Clin Neuropathol, 28,213-218.

sclerosing panencephalitis. Med Hypotheses 75, 576-577.

sclerosing panencephalitis., Nerology,62, 457-460.

embryogenesis. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A , 108, 331-336.

PKR. J Biol Chem, 284, 29350-29356.

epithelial cells. J Virol , 84,4183-4193.

December 2005) Wkly Epidemiol Rec 81, 15-19.

cells by shot hairpin RNA. J Virol 83,9423-9431.

5464-5468

entire CDV genome sequence. Virology, 193, 66-72.

oligomers. Virus Res., 140, 49-56.

631-641.

terminal an intergenic non-protein coding nucleotide sequences: completion of the

(1994) Defective measles virus in human subacute sclerosing brain. Virology, 202,

measles virus infectionsin cell cultures by peptide-conjugated morpholin

Fouet (2009) Adult fulminant subacute sclerosing panencephalitis: Pathological and

T. (2004) FunctionalMxA promoter polymorphism associated with subacute

Roig-Quilis M. (2006) Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis: Combined treatment

ADR1 suppress measles virus-induced apoptosis and activation of protein kinase

Samuel C.E.& Oldstone M.B. (2011) RNA editing enzyme adenosine deaminase is a restriction factor for controlling measles virus replication that is also required for

CD147/EMMPRIN acts as a fundamental entry receptor for measles virus on

Generalized and localized biased hypermutation affecting the matrix gene of measles virus strain that causes subacute sclerosing panencephalitis. J Virol ,63,

among Neurons. In Measles Virus Pathogenesis and Control, editors GriffinD.E.

Schneider-Schaulies J. (2009) Clearance of measles virus from persistently infected

Encephalitis usually refers to brain inflammation of various possible causes, including viral infections. Overall, viruses represent the most common cause of encephalitis in humans. The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates an annual incidence of usually between 150 and 3000 new cases per year of Arboviral encephalitis in the United States (http://www.cdc.gov/). Although several thousand cases of encephalitis of various viral origins are reported each year, the CDC suspects that many more cases may go unreported. Indeed, encephalitis can follow or accompany common viral illnesses, such as infectious respiratory diseases, and sometimes signs and symptoms of the latter may mask concurrent encephalitis. Most commonly, clinically relevant viral encephalitis affects children, young adults, or elderly patients. The involvement of other determinants, such as the nature of the specific viral agent, the host immune status, and various genetic and environmental factors, is also of importance.

The pathophysiology of viral encephalitis varies according to the virus family involved. Encephalitis occurs in two forms: primary encephalitis involving direct viral infection of the central nervous system (CNS; brain and spinal cord) and secondary encephalitis involving a viral infection which first occurs elsewhere in the body and then travels to the brain. Viruses may enter the CNS through two distinct routes: hematogenous dissemination or neuronal retrograde dissemination. The hematogenous spread, which is the most common path, involves the presence of a given virus in the blood (viremia), where it can either remain free for a period of time or infect leukocytes that will become some sort of viral reservoir. This latter situation, called the Trojan horse, is the route taken by human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) to disseminate to the CNS in humans. Arboviruses also use the hematogenous route to gain access to the CNS, where they can induce a zoonotic encephalitis, with the virus surviving in infection cycles involving bites by arthropods and various vertebrates, especially birds and rodents. After an insect bite, the virus can be transmitted in the blood of a susceptible animal after local replication in the skin.

Another form of viral spread towards the CNS is through retrograde neuronal dissemination, where a given virus infects neurons in the periphery and uses the transport machinery within those cells in order to gain access to the CNS.

Neuroinvasive viruses can damage the CNS as a result of misdirected host immune responses (virus-induced neuroimmunopathology) and/or viral replication, which will

Coronaviruses as Encephalitis - Inducing Infectious Agents 187

neuroinvasive, causing a large spectrum of diseases from hepatitis to encephalitis and chronic demyelination (Stohlman & Hinton, 2001; for reviews, see also Bender & Weiss, 2010

MHV exhibits various organ tropisms as well as pathogenic potentials. The most common strains used for pathogenesis studies are the neurotropic MHV-JHM (previously called MHV-4), the hepatotropic/neurotropic MHV-A59 and the hepatotropic MHV-3. Experimental infections of rodents with these strains provide animal models for human diseases such as hepatitis, encephalitis, and demyelinating diseases such as multiple sclerosis. Infection of mice by the intranasal or intracerebral route with MHV-JHM or MHV-A59 serves as a model for studying encephalitis and determinants of neurovirulence. MHV is part of the family *Coronaviridae* and the genus betacoronavirus. Its genome is 32 kilobases long and comprises different open reading frames (ORFs), which encode four structural proteins: spike (S), envelope (E), membrane (M), nucleocapsid (N), with some strains also expressing a gene encoding two other structural proteins: hemagglutininesterase (HE) and internal protein (I). The genome also encodes three nonstructural proteins, which functions remain poorly understood. The assembly of coronavirus virions needs a concerted action of three structural proteins: the membrane protein (M), the small envelope protein (E), and the nucleocapsid protein (N) (de Haan & Rottier, 2005; Masters 2006).

Among these three proteins, no role in pathogenesis has been reported for M and E.

While the molecular determinants of pathogenesis remain poorly understood, there is evidence that both host and viral factors play a role in coronavirus-induced disease. Experiments completed during the last decade have used infectious cDNA clones to produce viruses of high and low virulence to investigate, by the mean of reciprocal chimeric viruses, the molecular determinants of neurovirulence. Viral genes responsible for high MHV neuropathogenesis contribute to viral spread, replication and activation of

The S protein mediates attachment of the virus to its receptor on the target cell and viral fusion with the cell membrane, as well as viral entry and cell to cell spread (Collins et al., 1982; Williams et al., 1991). Based on previous studies, which used numerous variant viruses selected for resistance to neutralizing monoclonal antibodies, an association was made between various mutations or deletions in the S gene and neuroattenuation of the different strains of MHV (Gallagher et al., 1990; Wege et al., 1988). More recently, the use of recombinant MHV viruses with a modified spike (S) glycoprotein has definitively identified the S protein as a major determinant of neurovirulence. The recombinant A59 (rA59) virus which contains the S gene of JHM (SJHM) confers a highly neurovirulent phenotype. The viral infectious dose inoculated into mouse brain to induce a 50% lethal dose (LD50) is decreased by more than 1000-fold, demonstrating the role of S in neurovirulence (Phillips et al., 1999). Neuronal infection has long been proposed to be a major determinant of MHV neurovirulence (Dubois-Dalcq et al., 1982), and the recent use of recombinant viruses demonstrated that even if neurovirulence is increased, cellular tropism remained the same,

and Lane & Hosking, 2010).

innate/adaptive immunity.

**2.2.1 Spike glycoprotein: S** 

**2.1 Murine Hepatitis Virus: An agent of encephalitis** 

**2.2 Viral molecular determinants of encephalitis** 

directly induce damage to CNS cells (virus-induced neuropathology). In acute encephalitis, viral replication occurs in the brain tissue itself, possibly causing destructive lesions of the gray matter, as was described after herpes simplex virus (HSV), rabies, or some arbovirus infections. Rabies virus usually spreads to the CNS through retrograde peripheral nerve dissemination and one of the possible routes of HSV spread to the CNS is through the olfactory tracts.

Encephalitis caused by viruses generally can be classified into four different groups. (1) *Arboviruses* which appear to be the primary cause of acute encephalitis (Eastern Equine Encephalitis, Japanese Encephalitis, La Crosse Encephalitis, St. Louis Encephalitis, Western Equine Encephalitis, West Nile Virus Encephalitis). These viruses are transmitted to humans by the bite of infected mosquitoes and/or ticks. (2) *Enteroviruses*, such as coxsackievirus or polioviruses. These viruses spread through the fecal-oral route. Infection can result in a wide variety of symptoms ranging from mild respiratory illness (common cold), to, foot-and-mouth disease, acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis, aseptic meningitis, myocarditis, severe neonatal sepsis-like disease, and acute flaccid paralysis. (3) *Herpes viruses* constitute another major cause of encephalitis in North America. Members of this virus family include HSV, Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), cytomegalovirus (CMV), and varicella-zoster virus (VZV). They are highly contagious as they can be spread when an infected person is producing the virus. (4) Other viruses, following childhood viral diseases such as measles, mumps, and rubella can in rare cases develop secondary encephalitis. More recently, respiratory viruses were closely associated with encephalitis as reported for influenza virus (for reviews, see Maurizi, 2010 and Wang et al., 2010) or occasionally for coronaviruses (Yeh et al., 2004).
