PPT 1719

• Adenoviruses

  • Family: Adenoviridae
  • Genus: Mastadenovirus
  • Morphology: dsDNA; naked icosahedral, w/ approximately 50 serotypes
  • MOT: fecal-oral; respiratory; direct contact (eye)
  • Site of Latency: oropharynx
• Gastrointestinal Viruses

  • Adenoviruses
  • Astroviruses
  • Rotaviruses
  • Noroviruses
  • Enteroviruses
• Adenoviruses are the only virus with a fiber used as an organ of attachment and hemagglutinin, which is toxic to humans
• Adenoviruses can cause various conditions including epidemic keratoconjunctivitis, acute hemorrhagic cystitis, pharyngoconjunctival fever, and fatal acute respiratory disease
• Adenoviruses cause respiratory disease, eye infections, and GI disease
• Adenoviruses were first isolated from adenoid tissue
• Adenoviruses Treatment and Prevention

  Vaccine, Adequate chlorination of swimming pools
• Adenoviruses Laboratory Methods

  Adenoviruses are quite stable and can be isolated in human embryonic kidney and many continuous epithelial cell lines. They are grown in Hep-2 cells and produce a characteristic CPE with swollen cells in grapelike clusters
• Astroviruses are transmitted through the fecal-oral route and diagnosed by analyzing stool samples. Treatment involves supportive rehydration and electrolyte replacement if needed
• Astroviruses can cause mild to severe gastroenteritis, especially in infants and children
• Astroviruses

  • Family: Astroviridae
  • Genus: Mammoastrovirus
  • Genome: ssRNA viruses
  • Capsid morphology: naked icosahedral
• Rotavirus

  • Family: Reoviridae
  • Genus: Rotavirus
  • Genome: dsRNA
  • MOT: fecal-oral
  • Capsid Morphology: naked icosahedral
• Rotaviruses are the most common cause of viral gastroenteritis in infants and children, with symptoms including vomiting, diarrhea, fever, and abdominal pain
• Rotaviruses have a unique double-shelled capsule resembling a wheel or wheels with spokes appearance
• Rotavirus Laboratory Methods

  Not isolated in lab, ELISA and latex agglutination tests detect viral antigens in fecal material, Electron microscopy examination of stool samples can be used
• Rotavirus Treatment and Prevention

  Vaccinations: Human-bovine rotavirus vaccine (RV5; RotaTeq, Merck), Rotarix (RV1; GlaxoSmithKline
• Noroviruses

  • Family: Caliciviridae
• Rotavirus
• Polioviruses
• Norwalk virus is the prototype human calicivirus
• Enteroviruses

  • Family: Picornaviridae
  • Genus: Enteroviruses: Poliovirus, Coxsackievirus, Echovirus
  • Genome: ssRNA
  • Morphology: naked icosahedral (small and simple morphology)
  • MOT: fecal-oral
• Microscopy examination of stool samples

  Used in large reference or research laboratories
• Noroviruses

  • Family: Caliciviridae
  • Common names: Caliciviruses, Norwalk-like virus
  • Genome: ssRNA
  • Morphology: naked icosahedral
  • Unique feature: with cup-shaped depressions (calici – “calyx” or cup)
  • Size: 25-35 nm
  • MOT: fecal-oral, direct contact, airborne droplets of vomitus
• Noroviruses
• Noroviruses are the most common cause of infectious gastroenteritis in the U.S.
• Enteroviruses
• Polioviruses


  • One of the smallest and simplest viruses, with three serotypes causing poliomyelitis
  • Occur naturally only in humans
  • Ability to infect the Peyer’s patches through the fecal-oral route and motor neurons leading to paralytic poliomyelitis
• Polioviruses tend to infect the CNS and can cause paralysis in a small percentage of infected individuals
• Paralytic poliomyelitis happens when poliovirus attacks the brain and spinal cord, leading to paralysis of muscles
• Signs and symptoms of polioviruses include fever, headache, neck and back pain, asymmetric flaccid paralysis without sensory loss, pleocytosis
• Polioviruses laboratory method

  1. Viral isolation through stool (sensitive)

  2. PCR - CSF or viral culture
• Treatment/Management of polioviruses
• Coxsackieviruses were first isolated in Coxsackie, New York in 1948 and cause a variety of infections, including epidemic pleurodyn
• Coxsackievirus
• Hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) caused primarily by coxsackievirus types A5, A10, and A16 and occasionally by enterovirus type 71
• HFM primarily occurs in young children and is characterized by fever, throat pain, and red macules on the palate, tonsils, and tongue that evolve into painful ulcers
• Coxsackieviruses cause a variety of infections, including epidemic pleurodynia or Bornholm disease, and are subdivided into groups A and B based on their pathology
• Herpangina is another disease typically caused by coxsackie A viruses and characterized by fever, throat pain, and vesicular lesions on the soft palate and posterior oropharynx
• Common rash caused by coxsackievirus A16 and enterovirus 71 is herpetiform hand, foot, and mouth (HFM) disease
• Enteroviruses named after Coxsackie, New York where first isolated by Gilbert Dalldorf in 1948