This creates insights essential for the development of effective antivirus treatments and vaccines for the disease.
Researchers from Purdue University in the US have studied a strain of the virus isolated from a patient infected at the time of the French Polynesia epidemic and assessed the structure of the virus.
Structure details vital difference within a key protein explaining why Zika attacks nerve cells infected, while others viruses in the same family do not. Structure of the virus provides a map showing potential regions of the virus targeted by therapeutic treatment for creating an effective vaccine to enhance the ability to diagnose and distinguish Zika from other related viruses.
Lead researcher Richard Kuhn from Purdue University found the structure to be very akin to that of other flaviruses including dengue, West Nile, yellow fever and Japanese encephalitis not to mention tick borne encephalitic viruses, with RNA genome surrounded by lipid or fatty membrane inside an icosahedral protein shell.
- Zika is different from other flavi-viruses as it invades the nervous system of the developing foetus
- Zika is a mosquito borne disease reported in 33 countries.
- Zika has been associated with a birth defect known as microcephaly causing brain damage and a small head in babies borne to mothers infected at the time of pregnancy.
