SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and RNA dependent RNA polymerase as targets for drug and vaccine development: A review

The present pandemic has posed a crisis to the economy of the world and the health sector.Therefore,the race to expand research to understand some good molecular targets for vaccine and therapeutic development for SARS-CoV-2 is inevitable.The newly discovered coronavirus 2019(COVID-19)is a positive sense,single-stranded RNA,and enveloped virus,assigned to the beta CoV genus.The virus(SARS-CoV-2)is more infectious than the previously detected coronaviruses(MERS and SARS).Findings from many studies have revealed that S protein and RdRp are good targets for drug repositioning,novel therapeutic development(antibodies and small molecule drugs),and vaccine discovery.Therapeutics such as chloroquine,convalescent plasma,monoclonal antibodies,spike binding peptides,and small molecules could alter the ability of S protein to bind to the ACE-2 receptor,and drugs such as remdesivir(targeting SARS-CoV-2 RdRp),favipir,and emetine could prevent SASR-CoV-2 RNA synthesis.The novel vaccines such as mRNA1273(Moderna),3LNP-mRNAs(Pfizer/BioNTech),and ChAdOx1-S(University of Oxford/Astra Zeneca)targeting S protein have proven to be effective in combating the present pandemic.Further exploration of the potential of S protein and RdRp is crucial in fighting the present pandemic.

Significant Inhibition of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus In Vitro by Remdesivir,Its Parent Nucleoside and β-D-N^(4)-hydroxycytidine

Porcine epidemic diarrhea(PED)caused by porcine epidemic diarrhea virus(PEDV)is widespread in the world.In recent years,the increased virulence of the virus due to viral variations,has caused great economic losses to the pig industry in many countries.It is always worthy to find effective therapeutic methods for PED.As an important class of antivirals,nucleoside drugs which target viral polymerases have been applied in treating human viral infections for half a century.Herein,we evaluated the anti-PEDV potential of three broad-spectrum antiviral nucleoside analogs,remdesivir(RDV),its parent nucleoside(RDV-N)andβ-D-N^(4)-hydroxycytidine(NHC).Among them,RDV-N was the most active agent in Vero E6 cells with EC_(50) of 0.31μmol/L,and more potent than RDV(EC_(50)=0.74μmol/L)and NHC(EC_(50)=1.17μmol/L).The activity of RDV-N was further confirmed using an indirect immuno-fluorescence assay.Moreover,RDV-N exhibited a good safety profile in cells and in mice.The high sequence similarity of the polymerase functional domains of PEDV with other five porcine coronaviruses indicated a broader antiviral spectrum for the three compounds.Generally,RDV-N is a promising broad-spectrum antiviral nucleoside,and it would be worthy to make some structural modifications to increse its oral bioavailability.