Comparative Study of Gene Expression Profiling Unravels Functions Associated with Pathogenesis of Dengue Infection.

BACKGROUND: Dengue virus is a potential source of propagating dengue hemorrhagic fever. This virus leads to dengue hemorrhagic fever/dengue shock syndrome, benign syndrome, and severe syndrome and due to its infection, there occurs alterations at multiple levels such as gene expression and pathway levels. So, it is critical to understand the pathogenesis of dengue infection in terms of gene expression and the associated functions. METHODS: For this purpose, here, we have analyzed the temporal gene expression profiling for the dengue hemorrhagic fever dataset at 12, 24, and 48 hours. RESULTS: The outcome appears that the dengue hemorrhagic fever evolves differently at different time periods or stages. CONCLUSION: The change in the gene expression pattern increases exponentially from 12 hours to 48 hours and the number of altered functions (pathways) also increases. Wnt, apoptosis, and transcription signaling are among the critical pathways which are dominantly altered. In the initial phase (first 12 hours), only two pathways are altered due to dengue infection, while in the next 12 hours, eight pathways are altered, and finally, in the next 24 hours, 11 pathways are altered and most of these 11 pathways are very critical in terms of biological pathways and functions.

Zika Virus Targeting by Screening Inhibitors against NS2B/NS3 Protease.

Zika flavivirus is suspected to cause Guillain-Barre syndrome in adults and microcephaly, along with other congenital abnormalities in infants. Presently, no vaccines or therapeutics are available. Here, we report novel compounds identified by high-throughput virtual screening of Maybridge chemical database and molecular docking studies. We selected viral enzyme NS2B/NS3 serine protease as the therapeutic target because of its important role in viral replication. We selected seven potential compounds as antiviral drug candidates because of their high GOLD fitness score, high AutoDock Vina score, or X-Score binding energy and analyzed the strength of molecular interactions between the active site amino acids and selected compounds. Our study also provides a foundation for similar studies for the search of novel therapeutics against Zika virus.