Using a method to observe how the Ebola virus fuses with human cells on the microscopic level in real-time for the first time, researchers from the American Society of Microbiology have identified key mechanisms that enable the virus to adhere to and infect its host cells. The findings are published in mBio.
Though the World Health Organization declared the 2014-2015 Ebola outbreak in West Africa is over, there is still no approved vaccine or viable treatment for the infection. The researchers' discovery of proteins that play a key role in helping the virus gain a foothold at the cellular level could be leveraged to disrupt its ability to do so.
"This is the first time we are able to robustly follow the Ebola fusion initiation in real time, and it will allow us to look at even more aspects of the process and cellular factors involved in the future," Jennifer Spence, postdoctoral researcher at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.
The team hopes to eventually model the entire Ebola infection process to identify the most vulnerable parts that could be exploited for treatment or vaccine designs.