Researchers Identify Protein that Fights West Nile Virus

New Haven, Conn. Yale and McGill University scientists have identified a protein that is critical in fighting mosquito-borne West Nile Virus in mice. This finding could have therapeutic implications for controlling the potentially deadly virus in humans. The study appears in the Advance Online Publication of Nature Immunology. Researchers studied the role of caspase-12, a protein that activates secretion of substances that are part of the body's immune response. Caspase-12's function in fighting bacterial infection has been studied before, but its role in viral immunity has not. The Yale-McGill team found that caspase-12 regulated the signaling of RIG-I, a protein of the immune system that detects viral infection by recognizing its genetic components.