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Updated: Jul 15, 2025

Isolation of Fidelity Variants of RNA Viruses and Characterization of Virus Mutation Frequency
Published on: June 16, 2011
Patch formation driven by stochastic effects of interaction between viruses and defective interfering particles
Qiantong Liang1, Johnny Yang2, Wai-Tong Louis Fan2,3
1Department of Mathematics, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China.
Abstract:
Defective interfering particles (DIPs) are virus-like particles that occur naturally during virus infections. These particles are defective, lacking essential genetic materials for replication, but they can interact with the wild-type virus and potentially be used as therapeutic agents. However, the effect of DIPs on infection spread is still unclear due to complicated stochastic effects and nonlinear spatial dynamics. In this work, we develop a model with a new hybrid method to study the spatial-temporal dynamics of viruses and DIPs co-infections within hosts. We present two different scenarios of virus production and compare the results from deterministic and stochastic models to demonstrate how the stochastic effect is involved in the spatial dynamics of virus transmission. We compare the spread features of the virus in simulations and experiments, including the formation and the speed of virus spread and the emergence of stochastic patchy patterns of virus distribution. Our simulations simultaneously capture observed spatial spread features in the experimental data, including the spread rate of the virus and its patchiness. The results demonstrate that DIPs can slow down the growth of virus particles and make the spread of the virus more patchy.
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