Defective Interfering Particles and Their Role in Disease Progression and Persistence

Author(s): Alemayehu Reta

Defective interfering particles (DIPs) are products of inner deletion mutants of viruses that reproduce at the disbursement of the parent virus. This review article aimed at reviewing current science on DIPs of their molecular and immunological features, role in disease progression and persistence, impact on vaccine production and viral vectors, and future directions. Defective interfering particles are very important to the field of biotechnology and genetic engineering due to their nature of stimulating the immune system and attenuating some of the live viruses during live-attenuated vaccine production, however, they have a devastating effect like interfering with vaccine production, that is decreasing the viral titer, and facilitate pathogenesis and persistence of some viral infections.