Herpes Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Herpes, including details on herpes simplex virus (hsv), genital, oral, symptoms, treatment.

Sodium butyrate: a chemical inducer of in vivo reactivation of herpes simplex virus type 1 in the ocular mouse model.

Neumann DM, Bhattacharjee PS, Hill JM

Department of Ophthalmology (LSU Eye Center of Excellence), Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center at New Orleans, New Orleans, Louisiana 70112, USA.

Recent studies have explored the chromatin structures associated with the herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) genome during latency, particularly with regard to specific histone tail modifications such as acetylation and dimethylation. The objective of our present study was to develop a rapid systemic method of in vivo HSV-1 reactivation to further explore the changes that occur in the chromatin structures associated with HSV-1 at early time points after the initiation of HSV reactivation. We present a uniform, rapid, and reliable method of in vivo HSV-1 reactivation in mice that yields high reactivation frequencies (75 to 100%) by using sodium butyrate, a histone deacetylase inhibitor, and demonstrate that the reactivating virus can be detected at the original site of infection.

Published 14 May 2007 in J Virol, 81(11): 6106-10.
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