Analysis of the initiation of viral infection under flow conditions with applications to transmission in feed

Abstract

While kinetic models are widely used to describe viral infection at various levels, most of them are focused on temporal aspects and understanding of corresponding spatio-temporal aspects remains limited. In this work, our attention is focused on the initial stage of infection of immobile cells by virus particles (''virions'') under flow conditions with diffusion. A practical example of this scenario occurs when humans or animals consume food from virion-containing sources. Mathematically, such situations can be described by using a model constructed in analogy with those employed in chemical engineering for analysis of the function of a plug-flow reactor with dispersion. As in the temporal case, the corresponding spatio-temporal model predicts either the transition to a steady state or exponential growth of the populations of virions and infected cells. The spatial distributions of these species are similar in both of these regimes. In particular, the maximums of the populations are shifted to the upper boundary of the infected region. The results illustrating these conclusions were obtained analytically and by employing numerical calculations without and with the dependence of the kinetic parameters on the coordinate. The model proposed has also been used in order to illustrate the effect of antiviral feed additives on feedborne infection towards curbing disease transmission.

Lipid Nanoparticle Technology for Delivering Biologically Active Fatty Acids and Monoglycerides

“…Interestingly, however, such studies have only been conducted with free compounds and future efforts should be expanded to tracking the interactions of lipid nanoparticles with SLB platforms and membrane models. The need for such studies is further enhanced by emerging applications, e.g., antiviral mitigation in feed and drinking water [ 108 , 109 ], that would benefit from dilution-stable formulations of biologically active fatty acids, monoglycerides, and combinations thereof.…”

Virology from the perspective of theoretical colloid and interface science

“…More specifically, the human viruses are transmitted via (i) disruptions of the skin, (ii) mucosal membranes of the eye and genitourinary tract, (iii) alimentary canal, and (iv) respiratory tract (this is probably the most frequent channel of virus infection) [ 1 ]. In the coarse-grained models aimed at the kinetics of viral infection at the level of the susceptible and infected host populations, the transmission is usually described by using the phenomenological mean-field kinetic equations with corresponding rate constants [ 2 , 3 ]. Physicochemical models of the transmission are still lacking except those focused on the pathway (iv) occurring via respiratory droplets generated during sneezing, coughing, and talking.…”

“…The coarse-grained kinetic models of viral infection are usually temporal and operate with populations of virions and cells inside an infected person [ 22 ]. The spatiotemporal models are also available [ 3 , 22 ], but, as already noticed in the Introduction, the mechanistic details of virion transport inside the host are not described explicitly there. In fact, the corresponding full-scale mechanistic models are now often lacking.…”

Inhibition of African swine fever virus in liquid and feed by medium-chain fatty acids and glycerol monolaurate

“…Niederwerder et al showed that ASFv can be transmitted orally in liquids and in plant-based feed [ 13 ], which fits with epidemiological findings linking feed transmission to a past ASFv outbreak in Latvia [ 14 ]. Such findings motivate the development of mitigation strategies to reduce the infectivity of virus-contaminated feed and thus decrease feed-mediated infection probability, i.e., suppress growth of virus particle and infected cell populations in pigs [ 15 ]. One of the first swine viruses associated with feed transmission was porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDv) [ 16 – 18 ] and a formaldehyde-based additive has been demonstrated to reduce PEDv infectivity in feed [ 19 , 20 ].…”