tenOever LaboratoryVirology · Host defense · RNA biology
Pathogens

Influenza A virus

Orthomyxoviridae

Recorded terms: influenza A virus; influenza A virus H1N1 A/Puerto Rico/8/34; influenza A virus H1N1 A/Puerto Rico/8/34 NS1 R38A K41A; influenza A virus H3N2; influenza A virus H5N1; influenza A virus H5N1 A/Vietnam/1203/04; influenza A/California/04/2009; influenza A/California/04/2009 (H1N1pdm09); influenza A/WSN/33

2025 · Cell Host & Microbe · collaborative

Transcriptional repressor Capicua is a gatekeeper of cell-intrinsic interferon responses

The Capicua and ATXN1L repressor complex binds an eight-nucleotide motif at interferon and interferon-stimulated gene loci to hold them repressed during homeostasis in human and mouse cells, and is degraded through EGFR-MAPK signaling early in respiratory viral entry, which relieves that repression.

2023 · Journal of Virology · lab-led

ADAR1 Biology Can Hinder Effective Antiviral RNA Interference

Escape of a microRNA-targeted Sendai virus from engineered antiviral RNA interference comes not from the virus but from host ADAR1, whose adenosine to inosine editing destroys the target sites, and human ADAR1 also suppresses endogenous silencing in a plant.

2023 · Journal of Virology · lab-led

Archaeal Kink-Turn Binding Protein Mediates Inhibition of Orthomyxovirus Splicing Biology

Archaeal members of the L30 protein family, but not their orthologues from any other domain of life, block production of the spliced influenza A virus, influenza B virus and isavirus transcripts without measurably disturbing host splicing, identifying a shared and apparently noncanonical feature of orthomyxovirus splicing.

2023 · Science Signaling · co-led

SARS-CoV-2 airway infection results in the development of somatosensory abnormalities in a hamster model

Intranasal SARS-CoV-2 infection of golden hamsters deposits viral RNA without infectious virus in dorsal root ganglia and spinal cord, producing a milder but longer-lasting mechanical hypersensitivity than influenza A virus and a neuropathic dorsal root ganglion transcriptome at 31 days, from which ILF3 emerges as an analgesic target validated in mouse pain models.

2023 · Molecular Cell · collaborative

Stress granules are shock absorbers that prevent excessive innate immune responses to dsRNA

Stress granules restrain rather than amplify double-stranded RNA sensing, and cells lacking the granule nucleators G3BP1 and G3BP2, UBAP2L or PKR respond to double-stranded RNA with excessive RIG-I-like receptor, PKR and OAS activation and MAVS-dependent apoptosis.

2022 · Science Translational Medicine · co-led

SARS-CoV-2 infection in hamsters and humans results in lasting and unique systemic perturbations after recovery

Benchmarked against pandemic influenza in golden hamsters, SARS-CoV-2 uniquely sustains interferon signaling, chemokine production and myeloid activation in olfactory bulb and epithelium a month after clearance, alongside altered behavior and matching signatures in recovered human olfactory tissue.

2022 · Journal of Virology · collaborative

The Host Factor ANP32A Is Required for Influenza A Virus vRNA and cRNA Synthesis

Uncoupling the two steps of influenza A virus genome replication with viral promoter mutations shows that ANP32A is required for synthesis of both the complementary RNA intermediate and progeny genomic RNA, and that it acts on the actively replicating polymerase rather than the encapsidating one.

2022 · Journal of Virology · lab-led

The Host Response to Influenza A Virus Interferes with SARS-CoV-2 Replication during Coinfection

In golden hamsters, influenza A virus infection reduces SARS-CoV-2 replication during coinfection, after preinfection, and even one to two weeks after influenza has been cleared, while SARS-CoV-2 leaves influenza replication in vivo unchanged.

2021 · Nature Biomedical Engineering · collaborative

A human-airway-on-a-chip for the rapid identification of candidate antiviral therapeutics and prophylactics

A microfluidic bronchial airway chip lined with differentiated human airway epithelium and pulmonary endothelium reproduces strain-dependent influenza virulence, cytokine output and neutrophil recruitment, and when drugs are delivered at clinically achievable blood concentrations under flow it separates candidates that work in cell lines from those that also work in hamsters challenged with SARS-CoV-2.

2021 · Science Immunology · lab-led

Immune memory from SARS-CoV-2 infection in hamsters provides variant-independent protection but still allows virus transmission

Longitudinal tracking of antigen-specific lymphocytes in golden hamsters shows that memory from the founder strain of SARS-CoV-2 clears a beta variant rechallenge and that transferred memory T cells alone lower viral load, yet protected animals still infected every cohoused naive partner.

2021 · Immunity · lab-led

Leveraging the antiviral type I interferon system as a first line of defense against SARS-CoV-2 pathogenicity

Longitudinal transcriptional and histological profiling of SARS-CoV-2 infected golden hamsters maps a wave of inflammation that reaches tissues with little or no productive replication, and shows that intranasal type I interferon given before or after challenge lowers viral load and disease burden.

2021 · Journal of Virology · lab-led

Reduced Nucleoprotein Availability Impairs Negative-Sense RNA Virus Replication and Promotes Host Recognition

Restricting nucleoprotein availability in negative-sense RNA virus infections both blocks full-length genome replication and increases production of aberrant replication products that are sensed through RIG-I and MAVS, so a strong interferon response accompanies rather than follows successful infection.

2020 · Cell · lab-led

Imbalanced Host Response to SARS-CoV-2 Drives Development of COVID-19

Across cell lines, primary bronchial epithelium, ferrets and patient material, SARS-CoV-2 infection produces a transcriptional response distinguishable from that to other respiratory viruses, combining low type I and type III interferon induction with a moderate interferon-stimulated gene response and strong chemokine and IL-6 expression.

2019 · Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Medicine · lab-led

Synthetic Virology: Building Viruses to Better Understand Them

Frames influenza A virus as a compact genetic circuit whose modules can be disrupted, tagged or replaced, and organizes two decades of virus engineering into a design vocabulary of tracking, override, positioning and silencing modules that turns virus construction into a method of inquiry.

2019 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · lab-led

Type I interferon response impairs differentiation potential of pluripotent stem cells

Forcing an interferon-stimulated gene program in human induced pluripotent stem cells with a constitutively active IRF7 produces lasting transcriptional change and impaired germ layer differentiation, supporting the proposal that the canonical type I interferon system and pluripotency are difficult to hold simultaneously.

2019 · Cell Reports · collaborative

Viral Fitness Landscapes in Diverse Host Species Reveal Multiple Evolutionary Lines for the NS1 Gene of Influenza A Viruses

A library of 107 barcoded influenza A viruses differing only in their NS1 sequence, competed in dog cells, human cells, chicken eggs and mice, resolves NS1-driven fitness as a set of divergent and partly convergent evolutionary trajectories rather than a single ordered adaptation gradient.

2018 · Cell Reports · collaborative

Genome-wide CRISPR/Cas9 Screen Identifies Host Factors Essential for Influenza Virus Replication

A survival-based genome-wide CRISPR knockout screen in human lung epithelial cells selected with an avian H5N1 isolate recovers sialic acid biosynthesis and transport as the dominant requirement for influenza entry, with the CMP-sialic acid transporter SLC35A1 as the top hit, and identifies the transcriptional repressor capicua as a negative regulator of cell-intrinsic immunity.

2018 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · lab-led

Homologous recombination is an intrinsic defense against antiviral RNA interference

Applying one uniform small RNA-based selective pressure to four virus families in vertebrate cells shows that the ability to escape it tracks with the capacity for polymerase template switching rather than with genome polarity as such, since positive-strand viruses excise the targeted sequence while negative-strand viruses are cleared and a recombination-defective poliovirus cannot escape.

2017 · Nature · lab-led

RNase III nucleases from diverse kingdoms serve as antiviral effectors

RNase III nucleases, including human Drosha and homologues from bacteria, archaea, yeast and a urochordate, restrict positive-strand RNA viruses by recognizing unbranched RNA stem loops and impairing the viral polymerase, separably from microRNA biogenesis, catalysis and interferon.

2015 · Cell Reports · lab-led

Engineered Mammalian RNAi Can Elicit Antiviral Protection that Negates the Requirement for the Interferon Response

Recreating a small RNA antiviral response in mice, using either host microRNAs repurposed as virus-specific guides or a virus-encoded artificial small interfering RNA, attenuates influenza A virus by more than five logs and prevents disease without any requirement for type I interferon signaling.

2015 · Cell Reports · lab-led

In Vivo RNAi Screening Identifies MDA5 as a Significant Contributor to the Cellular Defense against Influenza A Virus

An attenuated influenza A virus engineered to deliver individual artificial small interfering RNAs enables a fitness-based loss-of-function screen inside an infected mouse, and that screen identifies MDA5 as a contributor to the antiviral response to influenza A virus despite the established role of RIG-I as the sensor that induces interferon beta.

2014 · Journal of Virology · lab-led

A Versatile RNA Vector for Delivery of Coding and Noncoding RNAs

Replication-incompetent influenza-based vectors carrying no DNA intermediate deliver coding messages and functional small RNAs together to primary human and mouse cells and to mouse lung, with output and cytotoxicity tuned by microRNA target sites in the nucleoprotein segment.

2014 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · lab-led

Drosha as an interferon-independent antiviral factor

Loss of the nuclear RNase III enzyme Drosha, but not of Dicer, increases RNA virus replication in mammalian fibroblasts, and diverse RNA viruses drive Drosha into the cytoplasm by CRM1-dependent export in a manner that does not require new protein synthesis, RIG-I, TBK1 or type I interferon signaling.

2014 · Cell Host & Microbe · lab-led

Influenza A Virus Transmission Bottlenecks Are Defined by Infection Route and Recipient Host

Genetically barcoded influenza A virus libraries tracked through cell culture, embryonated eggs, guinea pigs, ferrets and mice show that transmission bottlenecks differ by route and recipient, with airborne transmission reducing a diverse inoculum to as few as two founder clones.

2014 · Journal of Experimental Medicine · co-led

Long-term survival of influenza virus infected club cells drives immunopathology

A Cre recombinase-expressing influenza A virus combined with Cre-responsive reporter and ablation mouse strains showed that a subpopulation of directly infected lung cells, predominantly club cells, survives productive infection, sustains elevated interferon-stimulated gene and chemokine expression, and contributes to bronchiolar epithelial damage after virus is cleared.

2014 · Journal of Biological Chemistry · lab-led

Mitogen-activated Protein Kinase-mediated Licensing of Interferon Regulatory Factor 3/7 Reinforces the Cell Response to Virus

Sustained IRF7 activity induces the kinase MAP3K8, which phosphorylates the proline-rich hinge of IRF3 and redirects it from homodimers into IRF3 and IRF7 heterodimers, broadening the antiviral transcriptome and scaling the cellular response to the persistence of the viral threat.

2014 · Cell Reports · lab-led

The Mammalian Response to Virus Infection Is Independent of Small RNA Silencing

Engineering vesicular stomatitis virus to eliminate RISC-loaded small RNAs attenuates rather than enhances replication in mice, and confers no replication advantage even when interferon signaling is removed, arguing that small RNA silencing does not contribute to mammalian antiviral defense.

2013 · Cell Host & Microbe · lab-led

An In Vivo RNAi Screening Approach to Identify Host Determinants of Virus Replication

Replication-competent Sindbis viruses, each encoding an artificial microRNA against one murine open reading frame, turn viral fitness in infected mice into a selection-based screen for host restriction factors, identifying the transcription factors Zfx and Mga as maintainers of antiviral capacity.

2013 · Cell Reports · lab-led

Influenza A Virus Utilizes Suboptimal Splicing to Coordinate the Timing of Infection

The inefficient 5 prime splice site of influenza A virus segment 8 functions as a timing device, causing the nuclear export protein to accumulate slowly as a minor product of abundant NS1 transcription, with both raising and lowering that rate attenuating the virus through mistimed ribonucleoprotein export.

2013 · Cell Host & Microbe · collaborative

Is RNA Interference a Physiologically Relevant Innate Antiviral Immune Response in Mammals?

A critical appraisal of the evidence for antiviral RNA interference in mammals, accepting that mouse embryonic stem cells generate virus-derived small interfering RNAs while finding the somatic cell case unproven, because the viral proteins invoked also antagonize interferon.

2013 · Nature Biotechnology · co-led

MicroRNA-based strategy to mitigate the risk of gain-of-function influenza studies

Engineering target sites for miR-192, a microRNA abundant in human and mouse respiratory tissue but absent from the ferret respiratory tract, into the influenza A virus hemagglutinin segment attenuates the virus in mice while leaving replication and transmission in ferrets intact, providing a genetic layer of biocontainment for transmission studies.

2013 · Nature Reviews Microbiology · lab-led

RNA viruses and the host microRNA machinery

Argues that chordates, unlike plants, nematodes and arthropods, do not use small RNAs as antiviral defence, and that this absence of interplay between host microRNAs and RNA viruses is what leaves the microRNA machinery available for engineering viral tropism and small RNA delivery.

2012 · Journal of Virology · lab-led

A Small-RNA Enhancer of Viral Polymerase Activity

Influenza A virus small viral RNAs are shown to be synthesized from the complementary RNA intermediate, to load into the RNA binding cleft of the polymerase PA subunit, and to act there as segment-specific allosteric enhancers of full-length genome synthesis.

2012 · RNA · lab-led

Evidence for a cytoplasmic microprocessor of pri-miRNAs

Primary microRNA transcripts generated in the cytoplasm by a recombinant Sindbis virus are cleaved without any nuclear involvement yet still require Drosha, which relocalises from nucleus to cytoplasm on infection while the endogenous microRNA profile of the cell remains largely unchanged.

2012 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · lab-led

Hematopoietic-specific targeting of influenza A virus reveals replication requirements for induction of antiviral immune responses

Influenza A virus engineered to be silenced by the hematopoietic microRNA miR-142 shows that replication inside antigen presenting cells is dispensable for CD8 T cell priming and clearance but required for much of the RIG-I-dependent type I interferon response in vivo.

2012 · Molecular Therapy · lab-led

In Vivo Delivery of Cytoplasmic RNA Virus-derived miRNAs

A negative-sense cytoplasmic RNA virus, vesicular stomatitis virus, can be engineered to produce mature Dicer-dependent miR-124 that loads into Argonaute 2, silences targets, reaches many tissues in mice, and persists after the vector itself is cleared.

2011 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · co-led

IκB kinase ε (IKKε) regulates the balance between type I and type II interferon responses

Phosphorylation of STAT1 serine 708 by IKKε blocks formation of the STAT1 homodimer that constitutes GAF while leaving the STAT1 and STAT2 heterodimer of ISGF3 intact, biasing the shared STAT1 pool and the interferon-stimulated transcriptome toward the type I response.

2010 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · lab-led

Engineered RNA viral synthesis of microRNAs

Influenza A virus can be engineered to encode a cellular pri-microRNA inside an artificial intron of segment 8 and to produce mature, silencing-competent miR-124 during infection without measurable loss of replication or genome stability.

2010 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · lab-led

Influenza A virus-generated small RNAs regulate the switch from transcription to replication

Influenza A virus produces a family of 22 to 27 nucleotide small viral RNAs corresponding to the 5 prime end of each genomic segment, which accumulate as the polymerase shifts toward genome synthesis and whose inhibition selectively depletes genomic RNA without comparably affecting messenger or complementary RNA.

2010 · Journal of Biological Chemistry · lab-led

Transcription Factor Redundancy Ensures Induction of the Antiviral State

IRF7 and ISGF3 engage overlapping interferon-stimulated response elements and drive largely overlapping antiviral transcriptomes, so that a substantial interferon-like gene program is still induced when type I and type III interferon signaling are both absent.

2009 · Nature Biotechnology · lab-led

MicroRNA-mediated species-specific attenuation of influenza A virus

Engineering microRNA response elements for a mammalian-ubiquitous microRNA directly into the influenza A virus nucleoprotein coding sequence attenuates the virus in mice while leaving growth in embryonated chicken eggs intact, yielding live attenuated vaccine candidates for H1N1 and H5N1.

2007 · Science · training period

Multiple Functions of the IKK-Related Kinase IKKε in Interferon-Mediated Antiviral Immunity

Mice lacking IKKε produce normal interferon-β but fail to induce roughly a third of interferon-stimulated genes, because interferon activates IKKε, which phosphorylates STAT1 at Ser708 and thereby determines whether ISGF3 occupies a subset of response elements.