Korte beschrijving

Evasion of innate immune responses at epithelial surfaces is crucial for viruses that initiate the infection of their hosts at diverse mucosae, as happens for most of the alphaherpesviruses, including pseudorabies virus (PRV). The modulation of these early antiviral responses may be decisive for the fate of virus colonization of the individual. The innate immune response critically relies on signaling networks that sense the presence of the virus and transduce this detection into powerful (often pro-inflammatory) warning signals to the immune system. Among these, the nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) signaling axis plays a pivotal role. In the present doctoral dissertation, we carefully evaluated the interaction of PRV with the NF-κB pathway and addressed its outcome in porcine epithelial cells.