January 23, 2017 – CMV Susceptibility

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Anchor lead: How do genes and proteins influence whether someone gets a common viral infection? Elizabeth Tracey reports

Nod1 is the name of a protein that when altered, may increase susceptibility to infection with cytomegalovirus, abbreviated CMV.  That’s according to Ravit Boger, a pediatric infectious diseases expert at Johns Hopkins and long time CMV researcher. Boger says since CMV can be every bit as devastating as Zika to the developing fetus, it’s important to understand risk.

Boger: These diseases give us an opportunity to understand who is a more susceptible host to CMV, and what is the genetic makeup of a host that is more susceptible to CMV. And if we knew, if we could characterize this genetic makeup, then we could develop hopefully better vaccines or better treatment against CMV.  :26

Boger says even being able to identify people at risk for CMV infection could help physicians be on the lookout. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.