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Viruses
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Rabies Virus: Treatment and Prevention—2nd Edition
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Rabies Virus: Treatment and Prevention—2nd Edition

A special issue of Viruses (ISSN 1999-4915). This special issue belongs to the section "Viral Immunology, Vaccines, and Antivirals".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 March 2026) | Viewed by 2592

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Paulo Eduardo Brandão

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Preventive Veterinary Medicine and Animal Health, University of São Paulo, São Paulo 05508-270, Brazil
Interests: rabies treatment; rabies pathogenesis; Lyssavirus rabies molecular biology; virus-host coevolution
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Rabies is a 100% lethal zoonotic encephalitis caused by Lyssavirus species, chiefly, Lyssavirus rabies or rabies virus (RABV), which leads to 55,000 human deaths each year. Rabies patients experience extensive suffering, and there is no rational treatment currently available. Treatment must include the clearance of lyssavirus infection, targeting either the virus itself or host factors, the recovery of the damaged neural tissues, and physiotherapy. Attempts to treat human patients with a combination of antivirals have resulted in few survivors, and although reports have shown that antivirals can impair RABV replication both in vitro and in vivo, the field of rabies treatment lags behind compared to the progress in viral diseases, mainly due to it being a neglected area of study. Despite efforts to control rabies in reservoirs and the availability of highly effective pre- and post-exposure immunoprophylaxis, there is still a key need in this research field to develop a treatment for patients who are not protected by these preventive measures.

This Special Issue will showcase in silico, in vitro, and in vivo experiments in antivirals against lyssaviruses, as well as the results of clinical trials and innovative approaches to the prevention of rabies.

Dr. Paulo Eduardo Brandão
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Viruses is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • rabies
  • antiviral
  • treatment
  • prevention

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Related Special Issue

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

31 pages, 20709 KB  
Article
Combined Glycoprotein Mutations in Rabies Virus Promote Astrocyte Tropism and Protective CNS Immunity in Mice
by Mirjam Anna Rita Bertoune, Corinna Kolbe, Ann-Cathrin Werner, Maren Steinmetz, Bernhard Dietzschold and Eberhard Weihe
Viruses 2026, 18(2), 181; https://doi.org/10.3390/v18020181 - 29 Jan 2026
Viewed by 1227
Abstract
Rabies virus (RABV) causes fatal encephalitis once it invades the central nervous system (CNS), and treatment options are extremely limited at this stage. We investigated the recombinant RABV variants SPBN, SPBNGA (glycoprotein substitution R333E), SPBNGAK (R333E plus N194K), SPBNGAS (R333E plus N194S), and [...] Read more.
Rabies virus (RABV) causes fatal encephalitis once it invades the central nervous system (CNS), and treatment options are extremely limited at this stage. We investigated the recombinant RABV variants SPBN, SPBNGA (glycoprotein substitution R333E), SPBNGAK (R333E plus N194K), SPBNGAS (R333E plus N194S), and TriGAS (three copies of the R333E/N194S glycoprotein). We evaluated their cellular tropism and immune activation in an intracerebral mouse infection model using immunohistochemistry and confocal immunofluorescence. SPBNGAK (R333E/N194K) resulted in mixed neuronal and astrocytic infection and lethal disease. In contrast, the R333E/N194S mutations in the GAS variants were associated with reduced neuronal infection and apparent astrocyte-restricted infection patterns. This tropism shift coincided with microglial activation (allograft inflammatory factor 1, amoeboid transformation) and astrocytic activation (nestin), along with T-cell infiltration and endothelial activation that persisted beyond viral clearance. SPBNGAK-infected astrocytes expressed nestin, while GAS variant-infected astrocytes remained nestin-negative and were rapidly cleared. Intracerebral co-inoculation of astrocytotropic TriGAS with the lethal neurotropic DOG4 strain was associated with survival and a marked reduction in detectable DOG4 neuronal infection. These findings suggest that glycoprotein-mediated astrocyte tropism may be associated with altered immune responses after rabies CNS invasion. While mechanistic causality cannot be inferred, these observations may inform the design of future studies exploring astrocyte-restricted RABV infection in therapeutic-related contexts. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rabies Virus: Treatment and Prevention—2nd Edition)
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14 pages, 2747 KB  
Article
Serological Assays to Measure Rabies Antibody Response in Equine Serum Samples
by Nisha Beniwal, Banwari Lal, Sushma Mithina, Chandan Kumar Verma, Satendra Kumar, Vikas Phagna, Kamini Jakhar, Sudipta Sonar, Vishal Gupta, Rita Singh, Niraj Kumar, Chee Wah Tan, Riyesh Thachamvally, Harisankar Singha, Kripa Murzello, Aldon Fernandes, Lin-Fa Wang, Sankar Bhattacharyya and Shailendra Mani
Viruses 2026, 18(1), 108; https://doi.org/10.3390/v18010108 - 14 Jan 2026
Viewed by 980
Abstract
Rabies is a neglected tropical zoonotic disease caused by rabies-virus (RV) infection and is responsible for almost 60,000 annual deaths globally, largely affecting the socio-economically disadvantaged population. Although fatality is preventable by immunization either before or after exposure with therapeutic antibodies, the high [...] Read more.
Rabies is a neglected tropical zoonotic disease caused by rabies-virus (RV) infection and is responsible for almost 60,000 annual deaths globally, largely affecting the socio-economically disadvantaged population. Although fatality is preventable by immunization either before or after exposure with therapeutic antibodies, the high cost of prophylaxis or treatment limits their accessibility for the affected population. However, due to the almost 100% fatality rate in symptomatic individuals, almost 29 million annual vaccinations are performed, imposing high financial burden. Human transmission occurs principally through bites from infected dogs and although multiple mammalian species are permissive to RV, transmission from them or from symptomatic humans is rare. To overcome the limitations posed by the requirement of biosafety level-3 (BSL-3) containment for live virus culture, we established a replication-deficient vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) pseudovirus expressing the Rabies-G (RV-G) protein and a multiplexed Luminex immunoassay for quantifying anti-rabies antibodies in equine sera. The purified pseudovirus exhibited robust luciferase activity and was able to infect multiple mammalian cell lines, although with variable efficiency. Using hyper-immunized equine serum, we observed a strong correlation (ρ > 0.9, p < 0.001) between binding antibody titers measured by the Luminex assay with neutralizing antibody titers determined using the pseudovirus-based neutralization assay. These assays provide a safe, quantitative, and BSL-2-compatible platform for rabies serological evaluation and vaccine testing. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rabies Virus: Treatment and Prevention—2nd Edition)
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