THE nerve-destroying poliovirus may one day be an unlikely saviour for people
who suffer from nerve damage or neural diseases. Modified polioviruses can
deliver genes specifically to motor neurons in the brain and spinal cord,
studies in the US show.
Casey Morrow and his colleagues at the University of Alabama in Birmingham
have altered the virus’s genes to code for therapeutic proteins instead of coat
proteins. Viruses that can’t make coat proteins—known as
replicons—can enter cells, but still cannot replicate and spread to other
cells. “We anticipate using replicons to produce a variety of therapeutic
proteins delivered specifically…
