[Emerging reoviruses: the next pandemic?] / Les réovirus émergents : vers une prochaine pandémie?

As the world is experiencing the pandemic of SARS-CoV-2 responsible for COVID-19, one can wonder if members of other family of viruses could possibly emerge. Can such viruses establish a worldwide distribution with consequences similar to SARS-CoV-2? One such threat is the possible emergence of pathogenic reoviruses, especially by zoonotic transmission. Reoviruses are ubiquitous viruses exhibiting a worldwide distribution and various strains or isolates are found in many mammalian species and other vertebrates. When initially discovered, these viruses were named respiratory enteric orphan viruses (hence the acronym "reo") in order to reflect the fact that they could not be clearly associated with any given disease. However, this is not necessarily the case for all of these viruses, as clearly shown for some of these in animals. Significantly, there have been numerous reports of zoonotic transmission, especially from bats to humans. In this manuscript, pertinent properties of reoviruses will be first briefly presented followed by a review of available evidence for zoonotic transmission of pathogenic reoviruses to humans. Future work that appears to be needed for preparedness to the possible emergence of these viruses will then be briefly discussed.

The µ2 and λ1 Proteins of Mammalian Reovirus Modulate Early Events Leading to Induction of the Interferon Signaling Network.

It has been previously shown that amino acid polymorphisms in reovirus proteins µ2 and λ1 are associated with differing levels of interferon induction. In the present study, viruses carrying these polymorphisms in either or both proteins, were further studied. The two viral determinants exert a synergistic effect on the control of ß-interferon induction at the protein and mRNA level, with a concomitant increase in RIG-I. In contrast, levels of phospho-Stat1 and interferon-stimulated genes are increased in singly substituted viruses but with no further increase when both substitutions were present. This suggests that the viral determinants are acting during initial events of viral recognition. Accordingly, difference between viruses was reduced when infection was performed with partially uncoated virions (ISVPs) and transfection of RNA recovered from early-infected cells recapitulates the differences between viruses harboring the different polymorphisms. Altogether, the data are consistent with a redundant or complementary role of µ2 and λ1, affecting either early disassembly or the nature of the viral RNA in the incoming viral particle. Proteins involved in viral RNA synthesis are thus involved in this likely critical aspect of the ability of different reovirus variants to infect various cell types, and to discriminate between parental and transformed/cancer cells.