Common Laboratory Mice Are Susceptible to Infection with the SARS-CoV-2 Beta Variant

Autor: Ravi Kant, Lauri Kareinen, Teemu Smura, Tobias L. Freitag, Sawan Kumar Jha, Kari Alitalo, Seppo Meri, Tarja Sironen, Kalle Saksela, Tomas Strandin, Anja Kipar, Olli Vapalahti
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2021
Předmět:
Zdroj: Viruses, Vol 13, Iss 11, p 2263 (2021)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 1999-4915
DOI: 10.3390/v13112263
Popis: Small animal models are of crucial importance for assessing COVID-19 countermeasures. Common laboratory mice would be well-suited for this purpose but are not susceptible to infection with wild-type SARS-CoV-2. However, the development of mouse-adapted virus strains has revealed key mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein that increase infectivity, and interestingly, many of these mutations are also present in naturally occurring SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern. This suggests that these variants might have the ability to infect common laboratory mice. Herein we show that the SARS-CoV-2 beta variant attains infectibility to BALB/c mice and causes pulmonary changes within 2–3 days post infection, consistent with results seen in other murine models of COVID-19, at a reasonable virus dose (2 × 105 PFU). The findings suggest that common laboratory mice can serve as the animal model of choice for testing the effectiveness of antiviral drugs and vaccines against SARS-CoV-2.
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