Signaling Pathways in Viral Infection and Antiviral Immunity 2026
A special issue of Viruses (ISSN 1999-4915). This special issue belongs to the section "Viral Immunology, Vaccines, and Antivirals".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 October 2026 | Viewed by 63
Special Issue Editors
Interests: antiviral innate immunity; nucleic acid sensing and signaling pathways; RNA signaling; autophagy; cell death and stress response pathways in viral infections
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: HIV-1; HIV-1 Env; viral entry; macropinocytosis; CD4+ T cells; host-virus interactions; innate antiviral immunity; RNase L; stress granules; integrated stress response
Interests: HIV-1 persistence; latency; population dynamics; epigenetics; antiviral innate immunity; stress response pathways
Interests: HIV-1; host–virus interactions; innate immune response; viral pathogenesis; type I interferon response; pattern recognition receptors (PRRs) and antiviral immunity
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Virus infection activates a complex interplay of innate immune signaling pathways by engaging Pattern Recognition Receptors (PRRs), such as TLRs, RLRs (Rig-I/MDA5) and cGAS/STING, which detect viral components as PAMPs to trigger type I interferon (IFN) and proinflammatory cytokine production by activating the transcription factors IRF3/7 and NF-kB. Secreted IFN binds to the cell surface IFNAR receptors and activates the JAK-STAT signaling cascade to induce the transcription of various interferon-stimulated genes (ISGs) with broad antiviral roles. In addition, host cells activate various types of cell death pathways, autophagy and stress response pathways to provide further defense mechanisms to clear virus infections. Viruses, in turn, have evolved their strategies to counter the host response to sustain productive infection.
For this Special Issue, we invite submissions of original research, review articles and perspectives pertaining to signaling pathways in viral infection and antiviral immunity.
Dr. Malathi Krishnamurthy
Dr. Praveen Manivannan
Dr. Shelby Clark
Dr. Barkha Ramnani
Guest Editors
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
- innate immune signaling pathways
- antiviral signaling
- interferon signaling
- cytokine induction and inflammation
- host–virus interactions
- cell death pathways
- autophagy
- stress response pathways
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Related Special Issue
- Signaling Pathways in Viral Infection and Antiviral Immunity in Viruses (7 articles)

