Common Endemic Viruses Causing Upper Respiratory Infections

Richard Lee

Rhinoviruses are the most common family of viruses causing the common cold and are responsible for the majority of acute respiratory infections of human kind. It is something of a paradox that the most common of human viral pathogens is one of the more difficult viruses to study in the clinical and laboratory setting. Rhinoviruses thrive at temperatures of 33-34oC and are ideally adapted to the nasal mucosa, which maintains a surface temperature of approximately 34°C. Viral diagnostic studies using tissue culture must therefore be carried out at lower temperatures than those used in most clinical viral diagnostic laboratories. There are more than 100 rhinovirus serotypes. Infection by one serotype does not produce immunity to infection by heterologous serotypes.