Efficacy of Brilacidin against Venezuelan Equine Encephalitis Virus
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Smith, Miata
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Abstract
Venezuelan Equine Encephalitis Virus (VEEV) is a positive-sense, single-stranded, enveloped-RNA alphavirus of the Togaviridae family that is transmitted through the bite of an Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus mosquito species. There are no vaccines or therapeutic treatments available for VEEV, which exacerbates the need for better therapeutics. It is important to have therapeutics available that can inhibit viral replication and decrease the viral load early to stop the progression of neurological illness or damage and lessen the severity of other associated symptoms. Brilacidin is a potential antiviral drug that can be used to inhibit VEEV infection given its mechanistic ability to interfere with viral replication at the cell membrane. The efficacy of Brilacidin in VEEV will be evaluated through a series of experiments that will explore the dynamic of inhibition, safe testing concentrations, and its peak window of efficacy to gain a better understanding of the mechanistic impact on the host cell’s phospholipid bilayer in cell culture.
Description
This thesis has been embargoed for 2 years. It will not be available until May 2023 at the earliest.
Keywords
Brilacidin, Venezuelan, Encephalitis, Alphavirus