Didier Musso

Bio: Didier Musso is an academic researcher from Aix-Marseille University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Zika virus & Dengue fever. The author has an hindex of 36, co-authored 122 publications receiving 11279 citations.

Potential Sexual Transmission of Zika Virus

Abstract: In December 2013, during a Zika virus (ZIKV) outbreak in French Polynesia, a patient in Tahiti sought treatment for hematospermia, and ZIKV was isolated from his semen. ZIKV transmission by sexual intercourse has been previously suspected. This observation supports the possibility that ZIKV could be transmitted sexually.

Zika virus infection complicated by Guillain-BarrE syndrome – case report, French Polynesia, December 2013

Abstract: Zika fever, considered as an emerging disease of arboviral origin, because of its expanding geographic area, is known as a benign infection usually presenting as an influenza-like illness with cutaneous rash. So far, Zika virus infection has never led to hospitalisation. We describe the first case of Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) occurring immediately after a Zika virus infection, during the current Zika and type 1 and 3 dengue fever co-epidemics in French Polynesia.

Evidence of perinatal transmission of Zika virus, French Polynesia, December 2013 and February 2014.

Abstract: A Zika virus (ZIKAV) outbreak started in October 2013 in French Polynesia, South Pacific. We describe here the clinical and laboratory features of two mothers and their newborns who had ZIKAV infection as confirmed by ZIKAV RT-PCR performed on serum collected within four days post-delivery in date. The infants' infection most probably occurred by transplacental transmission or during delivery. Attention should be paid to ZIKAV-infected pregnant women and their newborns, as data on the impact on them are limited. .

Zika virus, French polynesia, South pacific, 2013.

Abstract: To the Editor: Isolated in 1947 from a rhesus monkey in Zika forest, Uganda, Zika virus (ZIKV) is a mosquito-borne flavivirus (1) For half a century, ZIKV was described only as causing sporadic human infections in Africa and Asia, which was mostly confirmed by serologic methods (2) In 2007, the first ZIKV outbreak reported outside Africa and Asia was retrospectively documented from biological samples of patients on Yap Island, Federated States of Micronesia, North Pacific, who had received an incorrect diagnosis of dengue virus (DENV) (3,4) We report here the early investigations that led to identification of ZIKV as the causative agent of an outbreak that started in October 2013 in French Polynesia French Polynesia is a French overseas territory located in the South Pacific The ≈270,000 inhabitants live on 67 islands distributed into 5 archipelagoes (Society, Marquesas, Tuamotu, Gambier, and Austral Islands) Surveillance for acute febrile illnesses is coordinated by the Department of Health with the contribution of a sentinel network of public and private practitioners, the main public hospital (Centre Hospitalier du Taaone), and the public health and research institute (Institut Louis Malarde [ILM]) As part of this syndromic surveillance system, ILM has implemented protocols for detecting arboviruses that are known to cause outbreaks in French Polynesia, such as DENV, or that pose a risk for causing epidemics because of the presence of potential mosquito vectors In addition, ILM provides DENV serotype identification for other Pacific island countries, including Yap State, as part of the regional surveillance of dengue (5) For that reason, a ZIKV reverse transcription PCR (RT-PCR) protocol by Lanciotti et al (3) was implemented at ILM In October 2013 (week 41), a 53-year-old women (patient 1) and 2 other members of the household—her 52-year-old husband (patient 2) and her 42-year-old son-in-law (patient 3)—experienced a mild dengue-like illness consisting of low fever (<38°C), asthenia, wrist and fingers arthralgia, headache, and rash Patients 2 and 3 also had conjunctivitis Patient 1 had swollen ankles and aphthous ulcers For all 3 patients, results were negative for DENV by RT-PCR and nonstructural protein 1 (NS1) antigen tests (5), for West-Nile virus by RT-PCR, and for chikungunya virus by RT-PCR; results of RT-PCR for ZIKV were equivocal for patients 1 and 2 During week 43, a 57-year-old patient (patient 4) reported similar symptoms; results of RT-PCR for DENV were negative, but results of RT-PCR for ZIKV were positive ZIKV infection was then confirmed by sequencing of the genomic position 858–1138 encompassing the prM/E protein coding regions of ZIKV (GenBank accession no {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"KJ579441","term_id":"636632075"}}KJ579441) The protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee of French Polynesia (reference no 66/CEPF) Phylogenetic analysis of the sequence (Figure) showed ZIKV strain Cambodia 2010-FSS13025 (GenBank accession no {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"JN860885","term_id":"380036385"}}JN860885) as the closest strain (6) Figure Phylogenetic analysis of partial M/E genes of 2 ZIKV strains, French Polynesia, 2013 The evolutionary history was inferred by using the maximum-likelihood method based on the Kimura 2-parameter model The percentage of trees in which the associated taxa Concomitant with these investigations, the Department of Health recorded an increased number of patients with a mild dengue-like syndrome and rash who were visiting primary care physicians Given this information, we performed RT-PCR for ZIKV on 10 samples collected during weeks 43 and 44 from patients living in different archipelagoes that had tested negative for DENV NS1 antigen Four samples gave negative results; 4, positive; and 2, equivocal Sequencing of 1 ZIKV-positive sample from a patient in Nuku Hiva, Marquesas Islands (GenBank accession no {"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"KJ579442","term_id":"636632077"}}KJ579442) showed that it had 100% homology with the fragment sequenced from patient 4 who lived in Tahiti, Society Islands The phylogenetic tree shows that the ZIKV that recently emerged in French Polynesia is similar to Cambodia 2010 and Yap State 2007 strains, which corroborates previous findings of an expansion of ZIKV Asian lineage (7,8) ZIKV was then isolated by inoculating Vero cells with RT-PCR samples positive for ZIKV After 6 days of propagation, ZIKV-infected cells were detected by indirect immunofluorescence assay using specific hyperimmune mouse ascitic fluids provided by the Institut Pasteur (Dakar, Senegal) (9) By week 51, the practitioners’ network recorded 5,895 patients with suspected ZIKV infections, leading to an estimate of 19,000 suspected cases when extrapolated to other care centers (adjusted to the mean consultation visits) Serum from 584 patients was tested by RT-PCR for ZIKV; 294 samples were positive This ZIKV outbreak is the largest documented and the first known to be caused by an arbovirus other than DENV in French Polynesia To assess when ZIKV circulation in French Polynesia might have started, we will be conducting a retrospective study on DENV NS1 antigen–negative samples collected before the first ZIKV cases were detected Investigations of the clinical features of ZIKV infections are ongoing Particularly, because French Polynesia is experiencing concomitant ZIKV, DENV-1, and DENV-3 outbreaks, attention will be paid to whether sequential infections may affect disease outcome Otherwise, because French Polynesia hosts several mosquito species, notably Aedes aegypti, already known to transmit ZIKV (10), but also other potential vectors, such as Ae polynesiensis, human and entomologic surveillances have been reinforced to clarify the emergence factors of this outbreak

SPAdes, a new genome assembly algorithm and its applications to single-cell sequencing ( 7th Annual SFAF Meeting, 2012)

Abstract: The lion's share of bacteria in various environments cannot be cloned in the laboratory and thus cannot be sequenced using existing technologies. A major goal of single-cell genomics is to complement gene-centric metagenomic data with whole-genome assemblies of uncultivated organisms. Assembly of single-cell data is challenging because of highly non-uniform read coverage as well as elevated levels of sequencing errors and chimeric reads. We describe SPAdes, a new assembler for both single-cell and standard (multicell) assembly, and demonstrate that it improves on the recently released E+V-SC assembler (specialized for single-cell data) and on popular assemblers Velvet and SoapDeNovo (for multicell data). SPAdes generates single-cell assemblies, providing information about genomes of uncultivatable bacteria that vastly exceeds what may be obtained via traditional metagenomics studies. SPAdes is available online ( http://bioinf.spbau.ru/spades ). It is distributed as open source software.

In situ immune response and mechanisms of cell damage in central nervous system of fatal cases microcephaly by Zika virus

Abstract: Zika virus (ZIKV) has recently caused a pandemic disease, and many cases of ZIKV infection in pregnant women resulted in abortion, stillbirth, deaths and congenital defects including microcephaly, which now has been proposed as ZIKV congenital syndrome. This study aimed to investigate the in situ immune response profile and mechanisms of neuronal cell damage in fatal Zika microcephaly cases. Brain tissue samples were collected from 15 cases, including 10 microcephalic ZIKV-positive neonates with fatal outcome and five neonatal control flavivirus-negative neonates that died due to other causes, but with preserved central nervous system (CNS) architecture. In microcephaly cases, the histopathological features of the tissue samples were characterized in three CNS areas (meninges, perivascular space, and parenchyma). The changes found were mainly calcification, necrosis, neuronophagy, gliosis, microglial nodules, and inflammatory infiltration of mononuclear cells. The in situ immune response against ZIKV in the CNS of newborns is complex. Despite the predominant expression of Th2 cytokines, other cytokines such as Th1, Th17, Treg, Th9, and Th22 are involved to a lesser extent, but are still likely to participate in the immunopathogenic mechanisms of neural disease in fatal cases of microcephaly caused by ZIKV.

Zika Virus Associated with Microcephaly

Abstract: Summary A widespread epidemic of Zika virus (ZIKV) infection was reported in 2015 in South and Central America and the Caribbean. A major concern associated with this infection is the apparent increased incidence of microcephaly in fetuses born to mothers infected with ZIKV. In this report, we describe the case of an expectant mother who had a febrile illness with rash at the end of the first trimester of pregnancy while she was living in Brazil. Ultrasonography performed at 29 weeks of gestation revealed microcephaly with calcifications in the fetal brain and placenta. After the mother requested termination of the pregnancy, a fetal autopsy was performed. Micrencephaly (an abnormally small brain) was observed, with almost complete agyria, hydrocephalus, and multifocal dystrophic calcifications in the cortex and subcortical white matter, with associated cortical displacement and mild focal inflammation. ZIKV was found in the fetal brain tissue on reversetranscriptase–polymerase-chain-reaction (RT-PCR) assay, with consistent findings on electron microscopy. The complete genome of ZIKV was recovered from the fetal brain.