Figure 3.

Zinc depletion specifically inhibits flavivirus infection. Caco-2 cells were treated with indicated concentrations of TPEN and incubated for 24 h. Cell proliferation (A) and cytotoxicity (B) was measured as described in the methods section. (C) Caco-2 cells were treated with indicated concentrations of TPEN and incubated for 4 h and amount of zinc depletion was measured by FACS using ZP-1. (D) Caco-2 cells were infected with DENV (10 MOI) or (E) JEV (3 MOI) or (F) RV (0.5 MOI) followed by treatment with TPEN at 0.5 μM. Viral titers in the culture supernatants were determined by plaque assay at 24 h pi for DENV and JEV; at 16 h pi for RV. Representative experiments are shown in D-F. Compilation of data from two or more experiments is shown for viral titers (G) and RT-PCR (H). (I) Caco-2 cells infected with DENV were treated with TPEN after virus adsorption for 4 h followed by addition of 10 μM of ZnSO₄/MnCl₂/MgCl₂/CuCl₂/FeSO₄ into the media. Viral titres were determined at 24 h post-addition of salts. All the data are from at least two independent experiments and presented as mean ± SD. ****p < 0.0001. ns, not significant.