SARS-CoV-2 virus tagged posts

Preclinical Data suggest Antioxidant Strategy to address Mitochondrial Dysfunction caused by SARS-CoV-2 virus

SARS-CoV-2
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Building upon groundbreaking research demonstrating how the SARS-CoV-2 virus disrupts mitochondrial function in multiple organs, researchers from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) demonstrated that mitochondrially-targeted antioxidants could reduce the effects of the virus while avoiding viral gene mutation resistance, a strategy that may be useful for treating other viruses.

The preclinical findings were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Last year, a multi-institutional consortium of researchers found that the genes of the mitochondria, the energy producers of our cells, can be negatively impacted by the virus, leading to dysfunction in multiple organs beyond the lungs.

SARS-CoV-2 proteins can...

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Study: In patients with Long COVID, Immune cells don’t follow the rules

Kailin Yin speaking with Nadia Roan in the lab
Kailin Yin (left), a postdoctoral fellow in the Roan Lab and co-first author of the study, collaborates with Gladstone Senior Investigator Nadia Roan. Their study revealed unusual activity among certain immune cells in people with long COVID.

People with long COVID have dysfunctional immune cells that show signs of chronic inflammation and faulty movement into organs, among other unusual activity, according to a new study by scientists at Gladstone Institutes and UC San Francisco (UCSF).

The team analyzed immune cells and hundreds of different immune molecules in the blood of 43 people with and without long COVID...

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Researchers find COVID-19 causes Mitochondrial Dysfunction in Heart and other Organs

Researchers find COVID-19 causes mitochondrial dysfunction in heart and other organs
A summary of prominent mRNA expression changes observed in COVID-19-derived nasopharyngeal samples collected early in infection when viral titers were high, SARS-CoV-2-positive rodent lungs when viral titers were in decline, and autopsy COVID-19 samples in which the virus had been cleared. Credit: Joseph W. Guarnieri, Gabrielle Widjaja, and Douglas C. Wallace.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, researchers have been trying to determine why this virus creates such negative long-term effects compared with most coronaviruses.

Now, a multi-institutional consortium of researchers led by a team at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and the COVID-19 International Research Team (COV-IRT) has found that the genes of the mitochondria can be ne...

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Molecular ‘Xulprit’ caught driving Cell Death and Inflammation

Highlights
•IFNγ and TLR signaling causes cell death via caspase-8, iNOS, and BAX/BAK
•Caspase-8 regulates BCL2 and iNOS expression to activate BAX/BAK independent of BID
•iNOS causes caspase-8 cleavage and destabilizes the BAX/BAK inhibitors MCL1 and A1
•Caspase-8 and iNOS promote severe disease upon SARS-CoV-2 infection of mice

A WEHI-led study has identified a molecular ‘culprit’ responsible for causing damaging levels of cell death and inflammation in the body. The findings could lead to improved treatment options for a range of conditions driven by inflammatory cell death, including the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Cell death is an important part of the body’s immune response to infection...

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