Figure 7. IRF-1 inhibits viral replication in primary neurons.

Primary hippocampal neurons cultured from WT and IRF-1^−/− mice. A, Cultures were infected with 0.01 MOI VSV-eGFP and stained with GFAP (astrocytes) and NeuN (neurons) by immunofluorescence assay. Scale bar 50 μm. B, Cultures were infected with 0.001 MOI VSV and viral replication from 24–72 hours were measured by plaque assay. Asterisks indicate statistical significance calculated by Mann-Whitney test, ** p<0.005. C, IRF-1^−/− mice was infected intranasally with 5×10⁶ pfu VSV. Representative pictures of immunohistological analysis of VSV-eGFP (green), DAPI (blue) in neurons (NeuN: red), astrocytes (GFAP: red) of the cerebrum and microglia (IBA: red) from the brain stem 6 days post infection. Scale bar 50 μm.