Study of pathogenic mechanisms and immune response against Rift Valley fever virus in livestock.

Understanding the pathogenesis of Rift valley fever virus (RVFV) infection in susceptible hosts is a prerequisite for developing models for testing RVFV vaccines and to identify new targets for clinical interventions. In general, domesticated ruminant models of RVFV have not been studied in detail over the course of infection, so that questions such as initial target organs for virus replications and virus-cells interactions, virus spread mechanisms depending on the route of infection, viremia titers as well as virus burden and target cells in specific tissues remain unclear. Due to the phylogenetic closeness with humans, sheep is a good model for conducting pre-clinical evaluations of vaccines as well as for studying RVFV-associated disease in humans and other livestock since pathological, virological and immunological assessments can easily be performed in this small ruminant highly sensible to RVFV infection.