Premium
Current views on ljungan virus and its relationship to human diabetes
Author(s) -
Niklasson Bo
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
journal of medical virology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.782
H-Index - 121
eISSN - 1096-9071
pISSN - 0146-6615
DOI - 10.1002/jmv.22062
Subject(s) - virology , biology , virus , diabetes mellitus , bank vole , pathogenesis , rodent , antibody , picornavirus , type 2 diabetes , rna , immunology , genetics , medicine , gene , population , endocrinology , ecology , environmental health
The Ljungan virus (LV), a member of the Parechovirus genus and Picornaviridae family was isolated originally from its wild reservoir, the bank vole ( Myodes glareolus ) at the Ljungan River in central Sweden [Niklasson et al., 1999]. LV is associated with diseases such as myocarditis, encephalitis, pregnancy related diseases, and diabetes in several species of wild rodent [Niklasson et al., 2006a]. The same outcomes can be induced in mice under controlled laboratory conditions [Niklasson et al., 2006b]. Several mouse and rat animal models used to study diabetes have been found to carry LV naturally [Niklasson et al., 2007]. The role of the viruses in diabetes pathogenesis has been investigated by treating these animals with antiviral compounds [Holmberg et al., 2009]. Variation in the incidence of type 1 diabetes has been found to track the fluctuations in native rodent populations in central Sweden. Increased prevalence of antibodies to LV has been detected in Swedish type 1 diabetes cases. However, LV virus has not been isolated and its viral RNA has not been detected in type 1 diabetes. J. Med. Virol. 83:1673–1673, 2011. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.