Published in:
Open Access
01-10-2019 | Encephalitis | Original Paper
The neuropathology of fatal encephalomyelitis in human Borna virus infection
Authors:
Friederike Liesche, Viktoria Ruf, Saida Zoubaa, Gwendolyn Kaletka, Marco Rosati, Dennis Rubbenstroth, Christiane Herden, Lutz Goehring, Silke Wunderlich, Miguel Frederic Wachter, Georg Rieder, Ines Lichtmannegger, Willibald Permanetter, Josef G. Heckmann, Klemens Angstwurm, Bernhard Neumann, Bruno Märkl, Stefan Haschka, Hans-Helmut Niller, Barbara Schmidt, Jonathan Jantsch, Christoph Brochhausen, Kore Schlottau, Arnt Ebinger, Bernhard Hemmer, Markus J. Riemenschneider, Jochen Herms, Martin Beer, Kaspar Matiasek, Jürgen Schlegel
Published in:
Acta Neuropathologica
|
Issue 4/2019
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Abstract
After many years of controversy, there is now recent and solid evidence that classical Borna disease virus 1 (BoDV-1) can infect humans. On the basis of six brain autopsies, we provide the first systematic overview on BoDV-1 tissue distribution and the lesion pattern in fatal BoDV-1-induced encephalitis. All brains revealed a non-purulent, lymphocytic sclerosing panencephalomyelitis with detection of BoDV-1-typical eosinophilic, spherical intranuclear Joest–Degen inclusion bodies. While the composition of histopathological changes was constant, the inflammatory distribution pattern varied interindividually, affecting predominantly the basal nuclei in two patients, hippocampus in one patient, whereas two patients showed a more diffuse distribution. By immunohistochemistry and RNA in situ hybridization, BoDV-1 was detected in all examined brain tissue samples. Furthermore, infection of the peripheral nervous system was observed. This study aims at raising awareness to human bornavirus encephalitis as differential diagnosis in lymphocytic sclerosing panencephalomyelitis. A higher attention to human BoDV-1 infection by health professionals may likely increase the detection of more cases and foster a clearer picture of the disease.