Psoralen Inactivation of Viruses: A Process for the Safe Manipulation of Viral Antigen and Nucleic Acid

High consequence human pathogenic viruses must be handled at biosafety level 2, 3 or 4 and must be rendered non-infectious before they can be utilized for molecular or immunological applications at lower biosafety levels. Here we evaluate psoralen-inactivated Arena-, Bunya-, Corona-, Filo-, Flavi- and Orthomyxoviruses for their suitability as antigen in immunological processes and as template for reverse transcription PCR and sequencing. The method of virus inactivation using a psoralen molecule appears to have broad applicability to RNA viruses and to leave both the particle and RNA of the treated virus intact, while rendering the virus non-infectious.