Research Article
Immune Modulatory Function of Human Cytomegalovirus-Encoded UL128 in the Pathogenesis of Infection Related Hearing Loss
Zheng Qi1,2, Tao R1, Gao H1, Xu J1, Sun Y3, Zhao N1, Gu W4 and Shang S1*
1Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Therapy of Neonatal Diseases, P.R. China
2Departments of Rheumatology and Immunology, Children's Hospital Affiliated to the Medical College, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
3Department of Otolaryngology, Children's Hospital Affiliated to the Medical College, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
4Department of Pathology, Children's Hospital Affiliated to the Medical College, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
- *Corresponding Author:
- Shang S
Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Therapy of Neonatal Diseases
3333# Binsheng Road Hangzhou, P.R. China
Tel: 86-571-87061007
Fax: 86-571-87033296
E-mail: shangshiq@163.com
Received date: June 02, 2017; Accepted date: June 27, 2017; Published date: June 30, 2017
Citation: Zheng Qi, Tao R, Gao H, Xu J, Sun Y, et al. (2017) Immune Modulatory Function of Human Cytomegalovirus-Encoded UL128 in the Pathogenesis of Infection Related Hearing Loss. J Infect Dis Ther 5:322. doi: 10.4172/2332-0877.1000322
Copyright: © 2017 Zheng Qi. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Inflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-a, interleukin (IL)-6 were supposed to participate in the tissue damage of human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) infection related diseases. The pathogenesis of HCMV associated hearing loss is poorly understood mainly due to the lack of applicable virus infected model. We subjected cochlear epithelial cell line derived from human auditory progenitors to HCMV infection and examined the levels of cytokines released in the co-cultural supernatant of peripheral blood monocytes and HCMV pre-infected cochlear epithelial cells. Human cochlear epithelial cell line cultured in vitro is replicable and permissive for HCMV productive infection. Detection of the co-culture system revealed up-regulation of cytokines including IL-6 and TNF-α. Since HCMV UL128 protein interferes with virus entry into epithelial cells as well as eliciting primary antibody in vivo, transcription of HCMV UL128 gene was suppressed by short interference RNA in this experiment. Cytokine analysis revealed that UL128 deficient HCMV got impairment of inducing IL-6 and TNF-α production when interacted with host immune cells. We deduce that UL128 may serve as a viral immune modulator participating in the pathology of HCMV related hearing loss and UL128 gene can be a potential target for treatment of infection induced immune pathological damage.