IFNA1 and viral infectious disease: More recently, the importance of the interferon response against neurotropic viral infection in humans was evidenced by the discovery that several cases of fatal herpes encephalitis in newborns were associated with genetic deficiencies in genes encoding signal transduction factors of the IFN pathway, such as TANK-binding kinase 1 (TBK-1), Toll-interleukin-1 receptor domain-containing adaptor-inducing beta interferon (TRIF), TLR3, unc93b or tumor necrosis factor receptor-associated factor 3 (TRAF3) [7,8,9,10,11] (reviewed in [12]).