Determination of cell line suitability for rapid isolation of herpes simplex virus

Herpes simplex virus (HSV) is one of the most commonly identified viruses in the clinical laboratory. HSV is of clinical consequence because of its ability to produce such life-threatening infections as encephalitis and neonatal disease. A variety of cell lines are currently being used for detection of HSV in cell culture. This study compared several cell lines simultaneously in a 96-well cell culture system to determine which lines demonstrated viral CPE most quickly following infection. In considering speed at which viral CPE is demonstrated, our results showed that primary rabbit kidney cells surpassed all other cell lines at 48 h post-viral infection. Alternative cell lines demonstrated to be suitable by this study were human fetal foreskin, human embryonic lung, and Vero cells.