Drug target for curing the common cold
UK scientists believe they may have found a way to combat the common cold.
Rather than attacking the virus itself, which comes in hundreds of versions, the treatment targets the human host. It blocks a key protein in the body's cells that cold viruses normally hijack to self-replicate and spread. This should stop any cold virus in its tracks if given early enough, lab studies suggest [DOI: 10.1038/s41557-018-0039-2] [DX]. Safety trials in people could start within two years.
The Imperial College London researchers are working on making a form of the drug that can be inhaled, to reduce the chance of side-effects. In the lab, it worked within minutes of being applied to human lung cells, targeting a human protein called NMT, Nature Chemistry journal reports.
Related: Vaccine Against the Common Cold may be Achievable
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Researchers have developed a vaccine that may be effective at preventing many forms of the common cold (rhinovirus):
A mixture of 25 types of inactivated rhinovirus can stimulate neutralizing antibodies against all 25 in mice, and a mixture of 50 types can do the same thing in rhesus macaques. In this paper, antibodies generated in response to the vaccine were tested for their ability to prevent the virus from infecting human cells in culture. However, the vaccines were not tested for their ability to stop animals from getting sick.
"There are no good animal models of rhinovirus replication," Moore says. "The next step would be human challenge models with volunteers, which are feasible because the virus is not very pathogenic."
Emory has optioned the vaccine technology to a startup company, Meissa Vaccines, Inc., which is pursuing a product development plan with support from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases' vaccine manufacturing services.
A polyvalent inactivated rhinovirus vaccine is broadly immunogenic in rhesus macaques (open, DOI: 10.1038/ncomms12838) (DX)
As the predominant aetiological agent of the common cold, human rhinovirus (HRV) is the leading cause of human infectious disease. Early studies showed that a monovalent formalin-inactivated HRV vaccine can be protective, and virus-neutralizing antibodies (nAb) correlated with protection. However, co-circulation of many HRV types discouraged further vaccine efforts. Here, we test the hypothesis that increasing virus input titres in polyvalent inactivated HRV vaccine may result in broad nAb responses. We show that serum nAb against many rhinovirus types can be induced by polyvalent, inactivated HRVs plus alhydrogel (alum) adjuvant. Using formulations up to 25-valent in mice and 50-valent in rhesus macaques, HRV vaccine immunogenicity was related to sufficient quantity of input antigens, and valency was not a major factor for potency or breadth of the response. Thus, we have generated a vaccine capable of inducing nAb responses to numerous and diverse HRV types.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 16 2018, @05:54PM (9 children)
The body may need this "key" protein for something?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday May 16 2018, @06:02PM (4 children)
Not to worry. If all the humans are dead, then viruses that target humans are going to be out of a job. Win-win, right?
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 16 2018, @06:05PM
Leave it to a conservative to come up with extinction as a game plan
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/s yes I know, what you couldn't scroll down for the disclaimer??
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bob_super on Wednesday May 16 2018, @06:21PM (1 child)
AC didn't mandate that blocking the protein would kill you.
Look, if you block his protein, you'll never have a cold, but most likely a heart attack in the next 20 years.
If you're young enough to care about a heart attack, use this new remedy which will prevent it, but guarantees a stroke within 30 years.
Don't want a stroke? There's this experimental prion-derived drug that will solve that problem, but Creutsfeldt-Jacob is pretty certain by the 40th anniversary.
And if you're too young to want that, I'm sure you don't want the new pill will will cure all of this but leave you impotent starting tomorrow.
(Score: 3, Funny) by realDonaldTrump on Wednesday May 16 2018, @09:25PM
I went with the Propecia. Still having INCREDIBLE sex! I’m so sexy you wouldn’t believe it.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Bot on Wednesday May 16 2018, @06:53PM
My AI suggests you might be employing sarcasm in your post, but I fail to detect any.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 3, Touché) by DavePolaschek on Wednesday May 16 2018, @06:21PM (1 child)
That's why it says
Killing the host is one way to make sure it doesn't catch a cold.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 17 2018, @05:03PM
I keep wondering why more people do not medicate with potassium cyanide,
it cures every disease and unlike the drugs from big pharma only has one minor side effect.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday May 16 2018, @07:37PM
Of course. After all, the summary says:
And how better attack the human host than by attacking the host's key proteins? ;-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 16 2018, @11:07PM
It works through deception. They tell you about the best invention ever and it turns out it was a hoax. It gave you diseases you can never get rid of.
They won't stop doing this. Spending big money to create diseases that cannot be fought. Diseases that are invisible and you accept them yourself, like most (not all) vaccines. Now they want to shut down your key proteins so you can do more slave work for the khazar banker vermin. The common cold is nature's way to give you a vacation you will otherwise not get. I don't think there has been any research (that was allowed to be distributed) about the good things brought by the common cold. There has got to be at least a few.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 16 2018, @06:12PM (5 children)
Create a lung cell culture line that contains enough of the viral genome to create the capsid, filling it with RNA to interfere with production of that protein. Trigger production based on an environmental cue so that the cell culture line doesn't immediately die. Mass produce the cells, trigger production, separate out the virus-like particles, and fill inhalers.
It probably works for lots of things.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 16 2018, @06:44PM (4 children)
It's as easy as pulling in a few npm modules and running a script as root.
(Score: 3, Funny) by maxwell demon on Wednesday May 16 2018, @07:39PM (3 children)
But God refuses to give us the root password, thus we need to resort to hacking.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday May 16 2018, @08:12PM (2 children)
All indications are that he lost it ages ago and never had much of a clue WTF he was doing either...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday May 16 2018, @11:22PM (1 child)
If you created billions of, well, anything, wouldn't you occasionally throw in a few jokers to see what happens ?
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday May 17 2018, @03:48AM
Not if the things I created were sentient, no.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 16 2018, @07:33PM (1 child)
The airborne particles tend to die when humidity is between 50% and 95%. Outside that range, they survive. Keep buildings in that range.
Run a HEPA filter. Put UV in the air conditioning ducts.
Wear a mask.
If you are sick, stay home. Notify people you may have infected. They should stay home too.
Make violations criminal.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Wednesday May 16 2018, @08:24PM
Or just get sick.
Your body will make antibodies and you be stronger for it.
There's a good reason dirty country kids tend to be healthier adults. They get childhood diseases* and then recover from them.
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* No, I am not advocating any sort of anti-vaccination nonsense. Some diseases should be avoided.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Wednesday May 16 2018, @08:24PM (2 children)
And thus far, I've never had the flu. I don't like the idea of injecting bad stuff into your body, which is basically what they do. But I've never had a flu shot and I've never had the flu. I just don't understand it myself, but I have friends that religiously get the flu shot and then they get the flu. You know, that helps my thinking because I say, why am I doing this? I passed on it.
(Score: 2) by stretch611 on Wednesday May 16 2018, @09:11PM (1 child)
Makes me wonder why you use propecia [washingtonpost.com], seeing how it isn't working at all. Unless, of course, you are not taking it for hair loss.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Wednesday May 16 2018, @09:35PM
It's not a shot, it's a pill. Very easy to take -- no needle. And it's working very well. I have all my own hair, as everyone knows.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Kilo110 on Thursday May 17 2018, @12:10AM (1 child)
Wash your hands.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 17 2018, @02:10PM
Yeah, that works great when people are coughing or sneezing around you.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 17 2018, @09:28AM
[Macro enters, holding Gemellus' severed head]
Caligula: I've cured his cough!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 18 2018, @07:04AM (1 child)
I'd be very happy to eat fresh oysters instead but they're not as cheap and easily available where I live.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 18 2018, @07:11AM
Potentially helpful against other diseases too: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5490603/ [nih.gov]
By the way you're often actually still sick but you don't suffer as much or at all: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130207131344.htm [sciencedaily.com]
Which is good enough for me when it comes to stuff like the common cold.