Understanding susceptibility and permissiveness to mpox virus across diverse mammalian species

Mpox, is a re-emerging disease caused by the mpox virus. Since May 2022, there was a multi-country outbreak of mpox in several regions of the world. Although the disease is transmitted from primarily from animals to humans, regular human-human spread has been recently observed making the transmission more than sporadic. Epidemiologic and molecular evidence indicate that mpox virus is found in animals including squirrels, Gambian pouched rats, dormice, and different species of monkeys. Thus, there is an urgent need to characterize the range of non-human mammalian hosts that could potentially be reservoirs for mpox virus. The main aim of our proposal will be to identify and validate the range of these reservoirs for mpox virus, and to characterize the innate antiviral immune responses of these mammalian species. Our research will specifically elucidate the susceptibility (supporting entry of virus into cells) and the permissiveness (ability to support virus replication) of diverse mammalian species to mpox virus. Information from this proposal will define the animal carriers of the virus and will lay a foundation for the molecular surveillance of mpox virus.