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Rotavirus diarrhea is still an important cause of mortality in children worldwide, responsible each year for about 500,000 deaths. The introduction of the vaccine against the virus could lead to a reduction in morbidity and mortality associated with rotavirus. In Brazil, the Rotarix ® rotavirus vaccine, which contains the genotype G1P [8], was included in the national programme of immunization since March 2006. This project aims to evaluate clinical and epidemiological data related to infection by RVA, rotavirus genotypes prevalent. The research project is a cross-sectional study in which children with acute diarrhoea were recorded prospectively from 2010 to 2012. The location of collection of fecal samples was the Hospital of urgency of Sergipe in Pediatric Emergency sector, in Aracaju/SE. The clinical and epidemiological information was obtained through a questionnaire. The clinical severity was determined by a scoring system 20, calculated from the survey point. It was verified the episodes of acute diarrhea and stool samples collected for research and genotyping of rotavirus by ELISA and RT-PCR method.Descriptive statistical calculations were carried out to define the epidemiology of rotavirus. EIA positive results were found in 78 of the 790 samples. The most frequent genotype was G2 P [4], followed by the G8 genotype P [4], P [8] G1, G3 P [8], G1 P [6]. Mixed infections were detected G2 P [4] P [8], P [4] and G1G2 G2G8 P [4] and in general there was a cocirculação of different genotypes in the years studied, moreover, shows an alternation between the genotypes every year. The results obtained in this study observed a variability of positive cases distributed, confirming that the seasonality in the region is not remarkable. Therefore, new strains of rotavirus are emerging and associated with severe diarrhea. For this reason, monitoring is required to follow changes in the epidemiology of rotavirus. / A diarreia por rotavírus ainda é uma importante causa de mortalidade infantil em todo o mundo, sendo responsável a cada ano por cerca de 500.000 mortes. A introdução da vacina contra o vírus pode levar a uma redução da morbidade e mortalidade associadas ao rotavírus. No Brasil, a Rotarix®, a vacina contra o rotavírus, que contém o genótipo G1P[8], foi incluído no programa nacional de imunizações em março de 2006. Este projeto teve como objetivo avaliar dados clínicos, epidemiológicos e genótipos predominantes relacionados à infecção por RV-A. O projeto de pesquisa é um estudo transversal em que as crianças com diarreia aguda foram registrados prospectivamente a partir de 2010 a 2012. O local de coleta das amostras fecais foi o Hospital de Urgência de Sergipe no setor de Urgência Pediátrica, em Aracaju/SE. A gravidade clínica foi determinada por um sistema de pontuação 20, calculado a partir do ponto de questionário. Foram verificados os episódios de diarreia aguda e coletadas amostras de fezes para pesquisa e genotipagem de rotavírus pelo método ELISA e RT-PCR. Cálculos estatísticos descritivos foram realizados para definir a epidemiologia do rotavírus. Resultados positivos foram encontrados em 78 das 790 amostras. O genótipo mais frequente foi G2P[4], seguido do genótipo G8P[4], G1P[8], G3P[8], G1P[6]. Foram detectadas infecções mistas G2 P[4] P[8], G1G2 P[4] e G2G8 P[4] e de um modo geral observou-se uma cocirculação de distintos genótipos nos anos estudados, além disso, nota-se uma alternância entre os genótipos a cada ano. O resultado obtido neste estudo observou uma variabilidade dos casos positivos distribuídos, confirmando que a sazonalidade na região não é marcante. Portanto, novas cepas de rotavírus estão surgindo e associados à diarreia grave. Por esta razão, a vigilância contínua é necessária para acompanhar as mudanças na epidemiologia do rotavírus.

Rotaviruses, members of the family Reoviridae, are the major etiologic agents of severe, acute dehydrating diarrhea in the young of many mammalian species, including humans, calves and foals. Recent estimates indicate an annual death toll of approximately 600,000 infants due to rotavirus, besides inflicting staggering economic burden worldwide. Most of these deaths occur in the developing countries and India is estimated to account for about a quarter of these deaths. Extensive molecular epidemiology studies carried out by our laboratory have revealed many interesting aspects about rotavirus diversity in this country. Molecular epidemiology of rotaviruses causing severe diarrhea in foals in two organized farms in northern India was carried out. These foal rotaviruses exhibited 5 different electropherotypes (E), E1-E5. Strains belonging to E1, E2 and E5 exhibited G10, P6[1]; G3 and G1 type specificities. Though the E1 strains possessed genes encoding G10 and P6[1] type outer capsid proteins, unlike the G10, P8[11] type strain I321, they exhibited high reactivity with the G6-specific MAb suggesting that the uncommon combination altered the specificity of the conformation-dependent antigenic epitopes on the surface proteins. Strains belonging to electropherotypes E3 and E4 were untypeable. Sequence analysis of the VP7 gene from E4 strains (Erv92 and Erv99), revealed that they represent a new VP7 genotype, G16. Nonstructural protein 4 (NSP4) of rotavirus is a multidomainal, multifunctional protein and is the first viral enterotoxin identified. We have recently reported that the diarrhea-inducing and double-layered particle (DLP)–binding properties of NSP4 are dependent on a structurally and functionally overlapping conformational domain that is conferred by cooperation between the N- and C-terminal regions of the cytoplasmic tail (Jagannath et al., J. Virol, pp 412-425, 2006). Further, a stretch of 40 amino acids (aa) from the C-terminus is predicted to be unstructured and highly susceptible to trypsin cleavage. We examined the role of this unstructured C-terminus of Hg18 NSP4 and SA11 NSP4 on the biological properties of NSP4 using a series of deletion and substitution mutants of the conserved proline and tyrosine residues in this region. Gel filtration, CD spectroscopy and Thioflavin T binding studies showed that these mutants have altered secondary structural contents and either failed to multimerize efficiently or multimerized with altered conformation. The C-terminal ten residues appear to play a regulatory role on multimerization. Proline 168, tyrosine 166 and methionine 175 appear to be critical determinants of DLP binding activity whereas, proline 165 and tyrosine 85 and 131 appears to determine the affinity of binding to DLP in the context of NSP4 ∆N72. Deletion and substitution mutants exhibited severely reduced diarrhea inducing ability and DLP binding property. Of great biological significance is the drastic decrease in the diarrhea inducing ability of the N- and C- terminal deletion mutant ∆N94 ∆C29 that exhibited about 11,000-fold increase in DD50 than the wild type (WT) ∆N72. These studies revealed that the predicted unstructured C-terminus is an important determinant of biological properties of NSP4. Extensive efforts to crystallize the complete cytoplasmic tail (CT) of NSP4 were unsuccessful and to date, the structure of only a synthetic peptide corresponding to aa 95-135 has been reported. Our recent studies indicate that the interspecies variable regions from aa 135-141 as well as the extreme C-terminus are critical determinants of virus virulence and diarrhea-inducing ability of the protein. Here, we examined the crystallization properties of several deletion mutants and report the structure of a mutant recombinant NSP4 from symptomatic (SA11) and asymptomatic (I321) strains that lacked the N-terminal 94 and C-terminal 29 aa (NSP4: 95-146) at 1.67 Å and 2.7Å, respectively. In spite of the high-resolution data, electron density for the stretch of 9 residues from the C-terminus could not be seen suggesting its highly flexible nature. The crystal packing showed a clear empty space for this region. Extension of the unstructured C-terminus beyond aa 146 hindered crystallization under the experimental conditions. The present structure revealed significant differences from that of the synthetic peptide in the conformation of amino acids at the end of the helix as well as crystal packing owing to the additional space required to accommodate the unstructured virulence-determining region. Conformational differences in this critical region effected by the presence or absence of proline or glycine at specific positions in the unstructured C-terminus, could form the basis for the wide range of variation seen in the diarrhea-inducing ability of NSP4 from different strains in newborn mouse pups. Although symptomatic and asymptomatic strains do not generally differ in the presence or absence of the conserved prolines or glycines, they contain a few additional changes that could alter the unique conformation required for optimal biological activity. In conclusion, we demonstrate that the predicted unstructured C-terminal region is indeed highly flexible and is an important determinant of biological functions of the NSP4, mutations in which probably correlates with the virulence properties of the virus.

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Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2017-03-13T17:29:42Z No. of bitstreams: 1 andressasilvinoferreiraassis.pdf: 3364177 bytes, checksum: ff9c20080e11e36f28daf805d56ecc7e (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2017-03-13T19:33:58Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 andressasilvinoferreiraassis.pdf: 3364177 bytes, checksum: ff9c20080e11e36f28daf805d56ecc7e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-03-13T19:33:58Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 andressasilvinoferreiraassis.pdf: 3364177 bytes, checksum: ff9c20080e11e36f28daf805d56ecc7e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-12-19 / O tratamento de esgoto pode ser insuficiente para a completa eliminação de vírus entéricos, tais como adenovírus humanos (HAdV) e rotavírus do grupo A (RVA). Portanto, o retorno do lodo e do efluente tratado ao ambiente pode representar riscos à saúde pública. Este estudo foi conduzido para otimizar um protocolo de floculação orgânica para recuperação viral a partir de lodo de esgoto e efluente tratado, bem como realizar um monitoramento de HAdV e RVA na estação de tratamento de esgoto (ETE) de Juiz de Fora, MG. Nos estudos de otimização, foram propostas adaptações no protocolo de floculação com leite desnatado para lodo e efluente tratado, com modificações no tempo de agitação da amostra, na concentração final de leite desnatado e/ou na etapa de centrifugação. No estudo de monitoramento, esgoto bruto (P1), esgoto primário (P2), lodo (P3) e efluente tratado (P4) foram coletados bimensalmente em 2014 (durante as épocas seca e chuvosa), totalizando 96 amostras (simples e compostas). As cargas virais foram determinadas por PCR quantitativo e o bacteriófago PP7 foi usado como controle interno. Amostras de HAdV e RVA foram submetidas ao sequenciamento e a viabilidade das partículas de HAdV foi avaliada em amostras de P4. Os parâmetros físico-químicos e a contagem de coliformes termotolerantes (CT) foram determinados em cada ponto. Nos estudos de otimização, foram selecionadas duas condições que apresentaram as maiores taxas de recuperação viral no lodo (menor tempo de agitação e maior concentração de leite desnatado) e no efluente tratado (sem primeira etapa de centrifugação e com maior concentração de leite desnatado). Ambas provaram ser ferramentas úteis para pesquisa viral em amostras de campo, inclusive para a pesquisa de vírus gigantes. No monitoramento, o HAdV foi detectado em 85,4% (82/96) dos concentrados, com cargas virais variando de 3,27 x 102 a 2,42 x 106 cópias do genoma por mililitro (cg/mL), ao longo do ano. A presença de RVA foi observada em 52,1% (50/96) dos concentrados (1,38 x 103 a 3,65 x 105 cg/mL), com maior detecção na época seca. A carga viral não foi influenciada pelo tipo de amostra, sendo detectada tanto em amostras simples, quanto em amostras compostas. Todas as amostras de HAdV sequenciadas pertenciam à espécie F tipo 41 e as amostras de RVA pertenciam ao genótipo I1. O tratamento de esgoto reduziu a quantidade de matéria orgânica e sólidos, bem como a contagem de CT e as cargas virais. No entanto, a presença de HAdV e RVA foi observada mesmo após o tratamento, inclusive em amostras de efluente tratado consideradas adequadas pelas legislações atuais, com detecção de partículas infecciosas de HAdV. Foram observadas correlações positivas entre a carga viral e a demanda bioquímica de oxigênio, os sólidos sedimentáveis e sólidos suspensos totais. Os dois protocolos otimizados neste estudo podem ser facilmente adequados para uso em laboratório de rotina, podendo impulsionar o monitoramento viral nos subprodutos gerados na ETE. A carga viral detectada na ETE salienta a disseminação ambiental de RVA e HAdV e aponta o potencial do HAdV como um marcador viral de contaminação em ambientes aquáticos. / Sewage treatment may be insufficient for the complete elimination of enteric viruses such as human adenoviruses (HAdV) and group A rotaviruses (RVA). Thus, the return of sewage sludge and treated effluent to the environment poses concerns potential for public health. This study was conducted to optimize an organic flocculation procedure for viral recovery from sludge and treated effluent, and carry out a surveillance of HAdV and RVA in a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) at Juiz de Fora, MG. In optimization studies, conditions were proposed for sludge and treated effluent with changes in the stirring time, in the final concentration of skimmed-milk and/or in the centrifugation step. In surveillance study, raw sewage (P1), primary sewage (P2), sludge (P3) and treated effluent (P4) were collected bimonthly in 2014 (during the dry and the rainy season), totaling 96 samples (simple and composite). Quantitative PCR determined viral loads and PP7 bacteriophage was used as internal control. HAdV and RVA strains were selected for sequencing, and the HAdV viability was evaluated in P4 samples. Physicochemical parameters and thermotolerant coliforms (TC) counting were determined at each point. After the optimization studies, two conditions were selected: the ones that showed the highest viral recovery rates in sludge (lower stirring time and higher concentration of skimmed-milk) and treated effluent (without the first centrifugation step and with a higher concentration of skimmed-milk). These conditions proved to be a useful tool for viral search in the field samples, including for the research of giant virus. In surveillance study, HAdV was detected in 85.4% (82/96) of the concentrated, with viral loads ranging from 3.27 x 102 to 2.42 x 106 genome copies per milliliter (gc/mL), throughout the year. RVA presence was observed in 52.1% (50/96) of the samples (1.38 x 103 to 3.65 x 105 gc/mL) with detection greater in the dry season. Viral load was not influenced by the type of sample being detected both in single samples, as in composite samples. All the sequenced HAdV strains belonged to species F type 41, and RVA strains belonged to genotype I1. Sewage treatment reduced the content of organic matter and solids, as well as the TC counts and the viral loads. However, the presence of HAdV and RVA was observed after treatment, even in samples considered adequate by current laws with detection of infectious HAdV particles. Positive correlations were observed between viral load and biochemical oxygen demand, sedimented solids and total suspended solids. Two optimized protocols in this study are easily suitable for routine laboratory use and can boost viral monitoring in by-products generated in the WWTP. Viral load detected in WWTP stress the environmental dissemination of HAdV and RVA and addressed the potential of HAdV as a virological marker of contamination in aquatic environments.

Rotavirus is one of the leading etiological agents of gastroenteritis in young of many species including humans worldwide and is responsible for about 600,000 infant deaths per annum. Rotavirus belongs to the Reoviridae family, and its genome is composed of 11 double-stranded RNA segments that encode six structural proteins and six nonstructural proteins. Rotavirus replication is fully cytoplasmic and occurs within highly specialized regions called viroplasms. NSP2 and NSP5 have been shown to be essential for viroplasm formation and, when co-expressed in uninfected cells, to form viroplasm¬like structures. A recent study suggest a key role for NSP5 in architectural assembly of viroplasms and in recruitment of viroplasmic proteins, containing four structural (VP1, VP2, VP3 and VP6) and two nonstructural (NSP2 and NSP5) proteins. NSP5, the translation product of gene segment 11 has a predicted molecular eight of 21 kDa. NSP5 has been reported to exist in multiple isoforms ranging in size from 28-and 32-35 kDa from a 26-kDa precursor has been attributed to O-glycosylation and hyperphosphorylation. To study different properties of the protein, recombinant NSP5 containing an N-terminal hisidine tag was expressed in bacteria and purified by affinity chromatography. A significant observation was the similarity in phosphorylation property of the bacterially expressed and that expressed in mammalian cells. While the untagged recombinant protein failed to undergo phosphorylation in vitro, addition of His tag or deletions at the N-terminus promoted phosphorylation of the protein in vitro, which is very similar to the reported properties exhibited by the corresponding proteins expressed in mammalian cells. Phosphorylation of NSP5 in vitro is independent of the cell type from which the extract is derived suggesting that the kinases that phosphorylate NSP5 are distributed in all cell types. Among the C-terminal deletion mutants studied, NH-∆C5 and NH-∆C10 were phosphorylated better than full-length NSP5, but NH-∆C25 and NH¬∆C35 showed substantial reduction in the level of phosphorylation compared to full-length NSP5. These results indicate that the C-terminal 30 residues spanning the predicted α-helical domain of NSP5 are critical for its phosphorylation in vitro which is in correspondence with previous findings that C-terminal 21 amino acids of NSP5 direct its insolubility, hyperphosphorylation, and VLS formation. The results revealed that though the tagged full-length and some of the mutants could be phosphorylated in vitro, they are not suitable substrates for hyperphosphorylation unlike the similar proteins expressed in mammalian cells or infected cells. Analysis by western blot and mass spectrometry revealed that the bacterially expressed NH-NSP5 is indeed phosphorylated. It appears that prior phosphorylation in bacteria renders the protein conformationally not amendable for hyperphosphorylation by cellular kinases in vitro. Mutation of the highly conserved proline marginally enhanced its phosphorylation in vitro but the stability of protein is affected. Notably, mutation of S67A, identified as a critical residue for the putative caesin kinase-I and-II pathways of NSP5 phosphorylation, affected neither the phosphorylation nor the ATPase activity of NSP5. These results suggest that bacterially expressed NSP5 by itself has undectable auto-kinase activity and it is hypophosphorylated. Purified recombinant NSP5 has been reported to possess an Mg¬ 2+-dependent ATP-specific triphosphatase activity. The results indicated that deletion of either C-terminal 48 amino acids or N-terminal 33 residues severely affected the ATPase activity of recombinant NSP5, underlying the importance of both N-and C-terminal domains for NSP5 ATP hydrolysis function. NSP5 expressed in rotavirus infected cells exists as inter-molecular disulfide-linked dimeric forms and it appears that the 46 kDa isoforms, that are phosphorylated, corresponds to dimer as revealed by western blotting. Analytical gel filtration analysis of NH-NSP5, NH-ΔN43 and NH-ΔN33-ΔC25 showed most of the proteins in void volume, but an additional peak corresponding to the mass of dimeric species further supports that NSP5 is basically a dimer that undergoes oligomerization. Analysis by sucrose-gradient fractionation revealed that NH-NSP5 and NH-ΔN43 proteins were mainly distributed in the lower fraction of the gradient suggesting the existence of high molecular weight complexes or higher oligomers. The multimeric nature of NSP5 and its mutants was further confirmed by dynamic light scattering which suggests that high molecular weight complexes are of homogenous species. The correlation curves showed a low polydispersity distribution and a globular nature of recombinant NH-NSP5 proteins. The present results clearly demonstrate that dimer is the basic structural unit of NSP5 which undergoes oligomerization to form a complex consisting of about 20-21 dimers. The nonstructural protein 5 is hyperphosphorylated in infected cells and cellular kinases have been implicated to be involved in its phosphorylation. NSP5 contains multiple consensus sites for phosphorylation by several kinases, but the cellular kinases that specifically phosphorylate NSP5 in infected cells are yet to be identified. Previous studies from our laboratory using signaling pathway inhibitors revealed that recombinant NH¬NSP5 and its deletion mutants can be phosphorylated in vitro by purified cellular kinases and by mammalian cell extracts. These studies also showed the involvement of PI3K-Akt and MAPK signaling pathways in NSP5 phosphorylation and a negative role for GSK3β in the phosphorylation of bacterially expressed recombinant NSP5 in vitro. In the present work, using phospho-specific anti-Ser9 GSK3β antibody, we observed that GSK3β is inactivated in a rotavirus infected MA104 cells in a strain-independent manner. GSK3β¬specific small interfering RNA (siRNA-GSK3β) reduced GSK3β levels leading to increased level of synthesis of the structural rotavirus protein VP6 and NSP5 hyperphosphorylation compared to control siRNA. The pharmacological kinase inhibitors (LY294002, Genistein, PD98059, and Rapamycin) studies at the concentrations tested did not significantly affect rotavirus infection as seen from the number foci, while U0126 severely affected rotavirus replication. The results clearly demonstrated the importance of the MEK1/2 signaling pathway in the successful replication of rotavirus and NSP5 hyperphosphorylation in rotavirus-infected cells. In contrast inhibition of GSK3β activity by LiCl, increased in general, the number of foci by greater than 2-fold for all viral strains studied. These results suggest that MEK1/2 pathway majorly contributes to GSK3β inactivation in rotavirus infected cells. Thus, our results reveal that rotavirus activates both the PI3K/Akt and FAK/ERK1/2 MAPK pathways and appears to utilize them as a strategy to activate mTOR, and inhibit GSK3β through phosphorylation on serine 9, the negative regulator of rotavirus NSP5 phosphorylation, and thus facilitate translational competence of rotaviral mRNAs during virus replication cycle. It was shown previously in the laboratory by co-immunoprecipitation assay that Hsp70 interacts with rotaviral proteins VP1 and VP4 in rotavirus-infected mammalian cells. In this study, the interactions between Hsp70 with VP1 and VP4 were further evaluated in vitro by GST-pull down assay. It was observed that the N-terminal ATPase and C-terminal peptide-binding domain of Hsp70 is necessary for its direct interaction with VP1 and VP4. The presence of Hsp70 in purified double-and triple-layered virus particles further supported the observed interactions of rotaviral proteins VP1 and VP4 with Hsp70. However, the specific interaction observed between Hsp70 and rotaviral capsid proteins, VP1 and VP4 in viral particles suggests that Hsp70 has an important role during rotavirus assembly which requires further investigation.