CHICAGO, Jan. 23 (Xinhua) -- A prior dengue virus infection could protect children from symptomatic Zika virus infection, according to a study by an international group of researchers including those from the University of Michigan.

The researchers used data from their long-standing Pediatric Dengue Cohort Study, established in 2004 in Managua. Of the roughly 3,700 participant children aged 2 to 14, 3,027 had known dengue infection histories, with 743 of them having at least one prior dengue infection and 176 with a recent dengue infection.

Through testing, the researchers found that 1,356 of them had had a Zika infection, and of those, 560 had symptomatic Zika.

The researchers compared children who had experienced a prior dengue infection to those who had not, to establish whether prior dengue infection affected whether the children were infected with Zika and the severity of the infection.

Among children infected with Zika, researchers found that children with a prior dengue infection were 38 percent less likely to develop symptomatic Zika than children without prior dengue exposure.

While dengue has been endemic to the Americas, Zika wasn't reported in the region until 2015. The viruses are very similar: they are transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquitoes and can cause similar symptoms, including fever, rash, and joint and muscle pain.

Researchers who work on mosquito-borne diseases believe there is an immunological interaction between dengue and Zika, and further research is needed to examine the interaction.

The study has been published on PLOS Medicine.