Cellular changes in blood indicate severe respiratory disease during influenza infections in mice

Leonie Dengler; Nora Kühn; Dai-Lun Shin; Bastian Hatesuer; Klaus Schughart; Esther Wilk

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0103149

Cellular changes in blood indicate severe respiratory disease during influenza infections in mice

PLoS One. 2014 Jul 24;9(7):e103149. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0103149. eCollection 2014.

Authors

Leonie Dengler¹, Nora Kühn¹, Dai-Lun Shin¹, Bastian Hatesuer¹, Klaus Schughart², Esther Wilk¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Infection Genetics, Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research, Braunschweig, Germany; University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Hannover, Germany.
² Department of Infection Genetics, Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research, Braunschweig, Germany; University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Hannover, Germany; University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, Tennessee, United States of America.

Abstract

Influenza A infection is a serious threat to human and animal health. Many of the biological mechanisms of the host-pathogen-interactions are still not well understood and reliable biomarkers indicating the course of the disease are missing. The mouse is a valuable model system enabling us to study the local inflammatory host response and the influence on blood parameters under controlled circumstances. Here, we compared the lung and peripheral changes after PR8 (H1N1) influenza A virus infection in C57BL/6J and DBA/2J mice using virus variants of different pathogenicity resulting in non-lethal and lethal disease. We monitored hematological and immunological parameters revealing that the granulocyte to lymphocyte ratio in the blood represents an early indicator of severe disease progression already two days after influenza A infection in mice. These findings might be relevant to optimize early diagnostic options of severe influenza disease and to monitor successful therapeutic treatment in humans.

MeSH terms

Animals
Blood Cell Count
Blood Cells / pathology*
Blood Cells / virology*
Cells, Cultured
Disease Models, Animal
Dogs
Female
Granulocytes / pathology
Host-Pathogen Interactions / immunology
Influenza A Virus, H1N1 Subtype / immunology
Influenza A Virus, H1N1 Subtype / pathogenicity
Lymphocytes / pathology
Mice
Mice, Inbred C57BL
Mice, Inbred DBA
Orthomyxoviridae Infections / blood*
Orthomyxoviridae Infections / complications
Orthomyxoviridae Infections / mortality
Orthomyxoviridae Infections / pathology
Respiration Disorders / blood*
Respiration Disorders / mortality
Respiration Disorders / pathology
Respiration Disorders / virology*
Severity of Illness Index

Grants and funding

This work was supported by intra-mural grants from the Helmholtz-Association (Program Infection and Immunity) and a research grant FluResearchNet (No. 01KI07137) from the German Ministry of Education and Research to KS. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.