Testicular immunology
Mumps is a viral disease which causes swelling of the salivary glands and testes. The mumps virus lives in the upper respiratory tract and spreads through direct contact with saliva. Prior to widespread vaccination programs, it was a common childhood disease. Mumps is generally not serious in children, but in adults, where sperm have matured in the testis, it can cause more severe complications, such as infertility.
Mumps
Mumps is usually preceded by a set of prodromal symptoms including low-grade fever, headache, and malaise. This is followed by progressive swelling of one or both parotid glands. Parotid gland swelling usually lasts about one week. Other symptoms of mumps can include dry mouth, sore face and/or ears and some patients find it difficult to talk. A vaccine has been available since the 1960s.The mumps virus is an enveloped single-stranded, linear negative-sense RNA virus of the genus "Rubulavirus" and family "Paramyxovirus". The genome consists of 15,384 bases encoding nine proteins. Proteins involved in viral replication are the nucleoprotein, phosphoprotein, and polymerase protein while the genomic RNA forms the ribonucleocapsid. Humans are the only natural host for the virus.