f Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) infections can produce severe disease and mortality. Here we show that CHIKV infection of adult mice deficient in interferon response factors 3 and 7 (IRF3/7 ؊/؊ ) is lethal. Mortality was associated with undetectable levels of alpha/beta interferon (IFN-␣/␤) in serum, ϳ50-and ϳ10-fold increases in levels of IFN-␥ and tumor necrosis factor (TNF), respectively, increased virus replication, edema, vasculitis, hemorrhage, fever followed by hypothermia, oliguria, thrombocytopenia, and raised hematocrits. These features are consistent with hemorrhagic shock and were also evident in infected IFN-␣/␤ receptor-deficient mice. In situ hybridization suggested CHIKV infection of endothelium, fibroblasts, skeletal muscle, mononuclear cells, chondrocytes, and keratinocytes in IRF3/7 ؊/؊ mice; all but the latter two stained positive in wild-type mice. Vaccination protected IRF3/7 ؊/؊ mice, suggesting that defective antibody responses were not responsible for mortality. IPS-1-and TRIF-dependent pathways were primarily responsible for IFN-␣/␤ induction, with IRF7 being upregulated >100-fold in infected wild-type mice. These studies suggest that inadequate IFN-␣/␤ responses following virus infection can be sufficient to induce hemorrhagic fever and shock, a finding with implications for understanding severe CHIKV disease and dengue hemorrhagic fever/dengue shock syndrome.

The fields of both developmental and stem cell biology explore how functionally distinct cell types arise from a self-renewing founder population. Multipotent, proliferative human neural crest cells (hNCC) develop toward the end of the first month of pregnancy. It is assumed that most differentiate after migrating throughout the organism, although in animal models neural crest stem cells reportedly persist in postnatal tissues. Molecular pathways leading over time from an invasive mesenchyme to differentiated progeny such as the dorsal root ganglion, the maxillary bone or the adrenal medulla are altered in many congenital diseases. To identify additional components of such pathways, we derived and maintained self-renewing hNCC lines from pharyngulas. We show that, unlike their animal counterparts, hNCC are able to self-renew ex vivo under feeder-free conditions. While cross species comparisons showed extensive overlap between human, mouse and avian NCC transcriptomes, some molecular cascades are only active in the human cells, correlating with phenotypic differences. Furthermore, we found that the global hNCC molecular profile is highly similar to that of pluripotent embryonic stem cells when compared with other stem cell populations or hNCC derivatives. The pluripotency markers NANOG, POU5F1 and SOX2 are also expressed by hNCC, and a small subset of transcripts can unambiguously identify hNCC among other cell types. The hNCC molecular profile is thus both unique and globally characteristic of uncommitted stem cells.

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