(Laboratory of Pediatric Brain Disease at Rockefeller University/Cell Stem Cell)The more researchers learn about the Zika virus, the worse it seems. Now, in a study in mice, researchers have found evidence that suggests adult brain cells critical to learning and memory also might be susceptible to the Zika virus. But some neural progenitor cells remain in adults, where they replenish the brain's neurons over the course of a lifetime. Gleeson and his colleagues suspected that if Zika can infect fetal neural progenitor cells, the virus might have the same ability to infect adult neural progenitor cells. Gleeson is the first to admit that the findings represent only an initial step in discovering whether Zika can endanger adult human brain cells.

Source: Washington Post August 18, 2016 16:07 UTC