QBI scientists decipher how Ebola, dengue, and Zika infect human cells

The Ebola, dengue, and Zika viruses wreak havoc on thousands of communities each year unchecked because there are no effective cures. But researchers from the Quantitative Biosciences Institute (QBI) at UCSF and the Gladstone Institutes may have finally discovered how these viruses infect human cells, and their findings are opening new avenues for future treatments.

In collaboration with research groups around the country, the researchers discovered that all three viruses sneak into human cells by hijacking human proteins. They also directly identified a drug that blocks this process for dengue and Zika in human cells in the laboratory, thus preventing infection—a necessary first step towards developing better therapies.

These results appeared in two studies, one study focusing on Ebola and the other study focusing on dengue and Zika, published December 13, 2018, in the same issue of the journal Cell. The work involved collaborations across many institutions in addition to QBI and the Gladstone Institutes, including Georgia State University, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and Baylor College of Medicine.

Both studies were led by QBI Director Nevan Krogan, PhD, who is also a faculty member in the UCSF School of Medicine’s Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology and a senior investigator at the Gladstone Institutes. QBI is an Organized Research Unit in the School of Pharmacy.

“We’re starting to see there’s overlap among the proteins hijacked by different viruses,” Krogan told Gladstone News. “Not only that, but these same proteins are often mutated in diseases with genetic roots, like cancer and autism. The more commonalities we can find between seemingly unrelated diseases, the better we can identify therapies to treat these devastating conditions.”

More

• Drug Targets for Ebola, Dengue, and Zika Viruses Found in Lab Study (Gladstone/UCSF News)
• QBI pioneers a collaborative and inclusive approach to scientific discovery (UCSF School of Pharmacy)
• Protein Interaction Mapping Identifies RBBP6 as a Negative Regulator of Ebola Virus Replication (Cell)
• Comparative Flavivirus-Host Protein Interaction Mapping Reveals Mechanisms of Dengue and Zika Virus Pathogenesis (Cell)
• Cell-jacking proteins could be the key to cracking Zika and dengue (Nature News)