Chikungunya Virus Glycoproteins Pseudotype with Lentiviral Vectors and Reveal a Broad Spectrum of Cellular Tropism

BACKGROUND: Outbreaks of the Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) infection has been documented in over 40 countries, resulting in clinical symptoms characterized by fever and joint pain. Diagnosing CHIKV in a clinical lab setting is often omitted because of the high lab safety requirement. An infection system that mimics CHIKV infection will permit clinical evaluation of the production of neutralizing antibody for both disease diagnostics and treatment. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We generated a CHIKV construct expressing CHIKV structural proteins. This construct permits the production of CHIKV pseudo-viral particles with a luciferase reporter. The pseudo-virus was able to infect a wide range of cell lines. The pseudovirus could be neutralized by the addition of neutralizing antibodies from patients. CONCLUSIONS: Taken together, we have developed a powerful system that can be handled at biosafety level 2 laboratories for evaluation of existence of CHIKV neutralizing antibodies.