Type-I interferon response affects an inoculation dose-independent mortality in mice following Japanese encephalitis virus infection

Background The laboratory mouse model is commonly employed to study the pathogenesis of encephalitic flaviviruses such as Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV). However, it is known that some strains of these viruses do not elicit a typical mortality dose response curve from this organism after peripheral infection and the reason for it has not yet been fully understood. It is suggested that induction of more vigorous Type-I IFN (IFN-I) response might control early virus dissemination following increasing infectious challenge doses of the virus. Thus, the objective of this study was to examine this suggested role of IFN-I in the mortality of mice infected with various doses of JEV.