NEW HUMAN PARVOVIRUS

BACKGROUND:

Parvoviruses are among the smallest DNA-containing viruses that infect animals and man. Parvoviruses are heat stable and generally resistant to chemical deactivating agents, which may account for their prevalence and persistence in the environment. In animals, many diseases such as canine parvovirus and feline panleukopenia exhibit high morbidity and high mortality in affected animal populations and the infections can persist endemically. In humans, the first identified pathogenic member of this family is parvovirus B19; other B19-related human parvoviruses include A6 and V9. B19 is highly contagious, exhibits high morbidity in affected populations, and causes fifth disease in normal individuals, transient aplastic crisis in patients with underlying hemolysis, and chronic anemia due to persistent infection in immunocompromised patients. B19 infection in pregnancy can lead to hydrops fetalis and fetal loss. B19 has also been implicated as the cause of chronic arthritis in adults where there is evidence of recent B19 infection, e.g., rheumatoid and inflammatory arthritis.

Despite the known pathogenicity of parvoviruses and the urgent need for methods to prevent, diagnose and treat parvovirus infections, other human parvoviruses have not yet been identified. Therefore a need exists to identify human parvoviruses and to provide a method for diagnosing, preventing and treating parvovirus infection. Moreover, there exists a need to provide methods to detect, purify and/or remove parvoviruses from samples such as human blood products.

INVENTION DESCRIPTION:

UCSF investigators have identified, for the first time, a new human parvovirus HP-4. Symptoms associated with HP-4 infection include cold-like symptoms or symptoms of an acute viral illness, including fatigue, night sweats, phyrangitis, myalgia, arthralgia, neck stiffhess, vomiting diarrhea, and confusion. Some or all symptoms, in varying degree, may be present in an HP-4 infection. They have also identified HP-4’s genomic sequence of the virus, and open-reading frames encoding viral proteins. Studies are currently underway to establish a link between this novel parvovirus and a human disease.

POTENTIAL ADVANTAGES:

• HP-4 sequence could be used to develop diagnostics, novel therapeutics and vaccines.

IP STATUS:

• U.S. patent pending



• International Patent Publication Number- WO06065273A2: NEW HUMAN PARVOVIRUS

REFERENCES:

• Fryer JF, Kapoor A, Minor PD, Delwart E, Baylis SA. Novel parvovirus and related variant in human plasma. Emerg Infect Dis. 2006 Jan;12(1):151-4.



• Jones MS, Kapoor A, Lukashov VV, Simmonds P, Hecht F, Delwart E. New DNA viruses identified in patients with acute viral infection syndrome. J Virol. 2005 Jul;79(13):8230-6.

If you would like to receive further information about this technology and potential licensing opportunities, please contact:

Sunita Rajdev, Ph.D.
Licensing Officer
(415) 353-4470 phone
sunita.rajdev@ucsf.edu

Reference: OTM Case #SF2004-073