ZIKA Virus and Neuroscience: the Need for a Translational Collaboration

Zika virus (ZIKV) has become a major challenge for scientists and health agencies. ZIKV’s involvement with human fetal microcephaly and Guillain-Barré syndrome and its transmission through Aedes africanus and Aedes aegypti mosquitos highlighted the epidemiological and neurological risks associated to ZIKV infection. In 2013, ZIKV arrives in Brazil but the first outbreak in the country was reported in 2015. Here, we used the Web of Science as a search tool for comparing the evolution of world and Brazilian scientific research on dengue virus (DENV)—also present in mosquito—, ZIKV and microcephaly. The association between ZIKV and microcephaly was only evidenced in 2015. Interestingly, Brazil and the USA are the responsible for most of these reports. Furthermore, the level of double-counted articles indicates a high degree of international collaborative effort in studying ZIKV and microcephaly. The ZIKV research clearly requires multidisciplinary expertise including epidemiologic, clinical, virological, and neurochemical backgrounds. This letter intends to emphasize the need of multidisciplinary studies and put forward some as yet unanswered questions in attempting to contribute to the understanding of this multifaceted health problem. In line with this, we recently constituted a collaborative and multidisciplinary taskforce encompassing eight Brazilian scientific institutions of excellence, The ZIKV translational research taskforce. This taskforce comprises a vast international network of collaborators and welcomes additional collaborators. We intend to advance fast in terms of mechanisms, which can potentially contribute to treat or halt ZIKV spreading around the world.