INFECTION OF SALIVARY-GLANDS, KIDNEYS, ADRENALS, OVARIES AND EPITHELIA BY MURINE CYTOMEGALO-VIRUS

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection of CD1 mice was investigated by immunoflurescence and virus titration. The salivary glands were obviously prime targets for the virus, infection involving initially perivascular interstitial cells and then spreading to acinar cells. The submaxillary gland was the most affected and, in mice infected at 3 wk of age, virus was recoverable from saliva for up to 58 days. The ovaries became infected, especially after intravenous injection of virus into pregnant mice, but it was corpora lutea and not ova that were involved. In the adrenals, the medulla was most heavily infected in suckling mice, the cortex in older mice. Virus was not recoverable from mammary glands or milk. Infection of respiratory epithelial cells did not occur, and in the skin only the dermis became infected, leading to the appearance of bald patches. Among mice surviving neonatal infection, about half continued to carry infectious virus in the kidneys for 12-26 mth, and a smaller number carried virus in the salivary glands. This was seen after infection with a virulent, salivary-gland-passaged strain of virus and also with an attenuated tissue-culture-passaged strain. Nearly all these surviving mice had chronic glomerulonephritis and hyaline acellular deposits of unknown nature in the adrenals and salivary glands.