Gene expression analysis of host innate immune responses in the central nervous system following lethal CVS-11 infection in mice.

The central nervous system (CNS) tissue of mice infected with the CVS-11 strain of rabies virus (RABV) was subjected to gene expression analysis using microarray and canonical pathway analyses. Genes associated with innate immunity as well as inflammatory responses were significantly up-regulated, corroborating with the previous findings obtained using attenuated viruses that did not induce a fatal outcome in infected mice. Histopathological examination showed that neurons in the cerebellum had undergone apoptosis. Although the extent of Fas ligand up-regulation was not so prominent, perforin and granzyme genes were highly expressed in the CNS of mice infected with CVS-11. The presence of perforin and granzymes both in the Purkinje cells and CD3 T lymphocytes strongly suggested that apoptosis of the former cells was induced by the latter cells.