Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Allopathic Medicine Faculty Publishes in PLOS ONE

Vladimir Beljanksi, Ph.D. from the Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Allopathic Medicine and NSU’s Cell Therapy Institute, along with his team and co-investigator Adil Duru, Ph.D. and his team, published a manuscript in the journal PLOS ONE. In this study, they utilized cardiac progenitor cells to show that such cells can be infected with Zika virus (ZIKV) which caused cell death. Most of previous studies have focused on neuronal progenitor cells due to ZIKV-induced abnormal functions of neuronal cells causing neurological disorders such as microcephaly in the newborns and Guillain–Barré syndrome in the adults. However, lesser known effects of ZIKV infection also include issues with cardiac tissues in infected individuals. The Duru/Beljanski teams exposed the cells to various amounts of ZIKV and followed viral replication over time. They then utilized systems biology approaches to examine mechanistic aspects of ZIKV infection which allowed them to determine potential therapeutic approaches that can be used prophylactically to prevent or decrease ZIKV infection of such cells. This project was funded by the Zika Research Grant Initiative, Florida Department of Health.