Current animal models: transgenic animal models for the study of measles pathogenesis

Animal models are highly important to understand the pathologic mechanisms of viral diseases. Therefore, the lack of a suitable animal model has greatly hindered the research into the pathogenesis of measles. Identification of two human receptors for measles virus, CD46 and CD150 (SLAM) has opened new perspectives in this field. During the last decade, numerous transgenic animal models have been developed in order to humanize mice and use them to study measles infection and virus-host interactions. Despite their limitations, these models have provided remarkable insights in different aspects of measles infection, providing a better understanding of virus-induced neuropathology, immunosuppression, mechanisms of virus virulence, and contribution of innate and adaptive immune response in viral clearance. They should certainly continue to help in studies of the host and viral factors that are important in measles infection and in developing of new antiviral agents and measles virus-based vaccines. In addition, as CD46 serves as a receptor for two other human viruses, some of these models may also find an important application in the study of adenovirus and herpesvirus 6 infection. In this review, we describe different CD46 and CD150 transgenic models and detail their utilization in the study of various aspects of measles pathogenesis.