Because the coronavirus waves keep coming and cases are on the rise once more, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) recently launched a $577 million effort to develop antivirals against COVID-19 and other viruses with high pandemic potential.
Texas Biomedical Research Institute Professor Luis Martinez-Sobrido, PhD, an authority in virology, vaccines and antiviral research, has been recruited to collaborate with three of the nine Antiviral Drug Discovery (AViDD) Centers for Pathogens of Pandemic Concern announced this spring. Dr. Martinez-Sorbrido has greater than 25 years of experience working on quite a few viruses, from influenza, coronavirus, hemorrhagic fever viruses, and developing vaccines and antiviral therapies against them.
NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) is funding the AViDD centers over the subsequent three years. The particular goals and research of every center will vary, but priority has been placed on developing antivirals that might be taken in an outpatient setting. Dr. Martinez-Sobrido and his laboratory shall be working with the Center for Antiviral Medicines & Pandemic Preparedness at Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California; the Antiviral Countermeasures Development Center (AC/DC) at Emory University and Georgia State University in Atlanta; and the QBI Coronavirus Research Group Pandemic Response Program at University of California, San Francisco.
Richard Plemper, PhD, a professor at Georgia State University is co-principal investigator of the middle delightfully often called AC/DC, with George Painter, PhD, a professor at Emory University. Dr. Plemper is a long-time collaborator with Dr. Martinez-Sobrido and recruited him to be a part of AC/DC.
“We’ve identified a bunch of foremost subject experts on viral pathogens and pioneers in recent, advanced methodology,” Dr. Plemper says in a press release from Georgia State University. “This formidable group is a serious strength of the middle. Drug development literally takes a village, and what we’ve brought together are leaders on this village who can move things forward.”
Dr. Martinez-Sobrido and his lab members will bring their expertise in developing fluorescent reporter viruses to simply discover and characterize drugs with broad antiviral activity. The modified SARS-CoV-2 reporter viruses glow, making it far easier and faster to screen a big array of antiviral candidates. The glowing reporter viruses make it possible to physically see which antivirals are effective and which usually are not. Simply put, no glowing = no virus present = antiviral worked.
Using reverse genetics approaches developed in his laboratory, Dr. Martinez-Sobrido and his team will even generate certain SARS-CoV-2 variations containing different mutations to higher understand how antiviral drugs interact with the virus, and to evaluate the potential for the mutations to flee the antivirals.
We would like to make certain the virus cannot escape, rendering the brand new drug ineffective. A part of the strategy shall be to develop and test drugs that concentrate on two or more different mechanisms against the virus. That way we will begin to expand the choices available to attack this and future coronaviruses.”
Luis Martinez-Sobrido, PhD, Professor, Texas Biomedical Research Institute
Martinez-Sobrido Lab members who will take part in the AViDD projects include Staff Scientist Chengjin Ye, PhD; post-doctoral fellow Ahmed Khalil, PhD; research associate Elizabeth Holguin; and UT Health San Antonio graduate students Ramya Sithaveni Barre, Desarey Morales Vasquez, Nathaniel Jackson and Kevin Chiem.
When announcing the AViDD centers in a press release, NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, MD, stressed that the continuing pandemic has underscored the necessity for a greater variety of treatment options, especially antiviral drugs that might be taken at home when symptoms are mild.
“Many years of prior research on the structure and vulnerabilities of coronaviruses greatly accelerated our response to the COVID-19 pandemic and we hope that similar research focused on antivirals will higher prepare us for the subsequent pandemic,” Fauci says.
Source:
Texas Biomedical Research Institute