COVID-19: Advances in diagnostic tools, treatment strategies, and vaccine development

Abstract

An unprecedented worldwide spread of the SARS-CoV-2 has imposed severe challenges on healthcare facilities and medical infrastructure. The global research community faces urgent calls for the development of rapid diagnostic tools, effective treatment protocols, and most importantly, vaccines against the pathogen. Pooling together expertise across broad domains to innovate effective solutions is the need of the hour. With these requirements in mind, in this review, we provide detailed critical accounts on the leading efforts at developing diagnostics tools, therapeutic agents, and vaccine candidates. Importantly, we furnish the reader with a multidisciplinary perspective on how conventional methods like serology and RT-PCR, as well as cutting-edge technologies like CRISPR/Cas and artificial intelligence/machine learning, are being employed to inform and guide such investigations. We expect this narrative to serve a broad audience of both active and aspiring researchers in the field of biomedical sciences and engineering and help inspire radical new approaches towards effective detection, treatment, and prevention of this global pandemic.

SARS CoV-2 Nucleoprotein Enhances the Infectivity of Lentiviral Spike Particles

“…The ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has provided a strong impetus for studies aimed at discovering and characterizing neutralizing antibodies or small molecule inhibitors targeted against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS CoV-2). A major focus of these efforts has been the spike (S) glycoprotein of the virus, which mediates the viral entry into target cells by recognition and binding to the cell-surface receptor angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) (Huang et al, 2020;Sreepadmanabh et al, 2020).…”

SARS-CoV-2: phylogenetic origins, pathogenesis, modes of transmission, and the potential role of nanotechnology

“…The novel virus, identified as Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), presents many interesting similarities with viruses that were associated with earlier outbreaks such as the MERS-CoV and SARS-CoV. Notable attempts to develop vaccine candidates and therapeutic solutions have been initiated, and pioneering efforts have helped produce a wealth of knowledge on the virus in question [ 83 ]. However, the rapid pace of development has also resulted in an overwhelming spread of inaccurate information about the viral origin and infectivity.…”

Is there any role of intermittent fasting in the prevention and improving clinical outcomes of COVID-19?: intersection between inflammation, mTOR pathway, autophagy and calorie restriction

“…To this day, COVID-19 management is still continuously changing. The antiviral Remdesivir has been authorized for the treatment of suspected or laboratoryconfirmed COVID-19 in hospitalized patients with severe disease after data showed a decrease in the time to improvement from 14 to 11 days without clear benefit in mortality [51]. Dexamethasone also showed promising results when it proved to reduce mortality among those receiving invasive mechanical ventilation or oxygen at randomization [47].…”

“…Dexamethasone also showed promising results when it proved to reduce mortality among those receiving invasive mechanical ventilation or oxygen at randomization [47]. Other therapeutics are being studied currently in the United States and worldwide which can be found elsewhere [51]. Even though the academic world is intensively researching this topic, there is still no ''game changer'' in the management of COVID 19. Recently, the molecular mechanisms that allow the SARS-CoV-2 and other Human Coronavirus to fully display its pathogenic capacity have been under scrutiny [7,21].…”