Tropical Medicine and Health
Online ISSN : 1349-4147
Print ISSN : 1348-8945
ISSN-L : 1348-8945
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Quasispecies of dengue virus
Takeshi Kurosu
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JOURNAL FREE ACCESS

2011 Volume 39 Issue 4SUPPLEMENT Pages S29-S36

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Abstract

Pathogenic viruses have RNA genomes that cause acute and chronic infections. These viruses replicate with high mutation rates and exhibit significant genetic diversity, so-called viral quasispecies. Viral quasispecies play an important role in chronic infectious diseases, but little is known about their involvement in acute infectious diseases such as dengue virus (DENV) infection. DENV, the most important human arbovirus, is a causative agent of dengue fever (DF) and dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF). Accumulating observations suggest that DENV exists as an extremely diverse virus population, but its biological significance is unclear. In other virus diseases, quasispecies affect the therapeutic strategies using drugs and vaccines. Here, I describe the quasispecies of DENV and discuss the possible role of quasispecies in the pathogenesis of and therapeutic strategy against DENV infection in comparison with other viruses such as Hepatitis C virus, human immunodeficiency virus type 1, and poliovirus.

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© 2011 by The Japanese Society of Tropical Medicine
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