Integrated Cell Culture-Mass Spectrometry Method for Infectious Human Virus Monitoring

Tools for detecting infectious human
viruses in environmental samples
are essential for protecting human health. Here, we developed an Integrated
Cell Culture-Mass Spectrometry (ICC-MS) method that detects infectious
viruses by identifying viral proteins that replicate in cell cultures.
The ICC-MS method was first validated and optimized with murine hepatitis
viruses (MHV) spiked in culture media and wastewater concentrates
and then applied to detect human viruses in untreated and treated
wastewater samples. Reoviruses were detected in wastewater samples
when the method was applied with Vero, BGMK, and BSC-1 cell lines.
Strain-specific viral peptides from reovirus type 1, type 2, and type
3 were detected in primary influent, secondary effluent (pre-UV treatment),
and UV-treated effluent. We propose that the ICC-MS method is a promising
technique for directly detecting infectious human viruses in environmental
samples without the need for primer design. This method can be expanded
in future work to detect and quantify more types of culturable viruses
and to address questions of virus fate and transmission in the environment.