Swine influenza infections in porcine airway organoids

Influenza A virus (IAV) infections cause disease in humans, poultry and wild birds, but are also an important cause of respiratory infections in pigs. Swine IAV (IAVsw) infections can result in severe disease, and have a high impact on the pig sector. In addition, zoonotic IAVsw infections can also be relevant for public health. Pigs have been proposed as a potential ‘mixing vessel’ for the exchange of genetic segments (‘reassortment’), potentially resulting in viruses with increased fitness in novel hosts. In the context of zoonotic awareness, surveillance of IAV strains that circulate in animal species is crucial.

Progress (September 2023)

In the first two years of the NLAS CCS Airway project (2021-2022), the researchers have developed porcine respiratory organoid-based air-liquid interface (ALI) cultures, and successfully performed pilot infection studies with three IAVsw strains.

In 2023 and 2024, the scientists investigated the impact of both viral and host factors. The researchers obtained and characterizedprimary IAVsw isolates, and used these to study the impact of airway defenses and sialylation of IAV receptors on the susceptibility and permissiveness of porcine airway ALI cultures to IAVsw infection.

In addition to the aforementioned follow-up project, the original project also gave rise to the new projectAIR-MUNE.

Progress (May 2025)

This project resulted in a publication comparing different swine influenza strains. In addition, experiments were conducted in which the researchers examined the effect of sialylation of IAV receptors on the susceptibility of swine airway ALIs to infection with IAVsw. Furthermore, the effect of immune system modulators on susceptibility to IAVsw was also studied.

This project led to follow-up in vitro studies comparing IAV strains derived from different hosts on airway cultures of different animal species.