SARS-CoV-2 infection: The role of cytokines in COVID-19 disease

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Authors: Víctor J Costela-Ruiz 1, Rebeca Illescas-Montes 1, Jose M Puerta-Puerta 2, Concepción Ruiz 3, Lucia Melguizo-Rodríguez 1 COVID-19 disease, caused by infection with SARS-CoV-2, is related to a series of physiopathological mechanisms that mobilize a wide variety of biomolecules, mainly immunological in nature. In the most severe cases, the prognosis can be markedly worsened by the hyperproduction of mainly proinflammatory cytokines, such as […]

Cytokine storm in COVID-19: pathogenesis and overview of anti-inflammatory agents used in treatment

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Authors: Mehmet Soy 1, Gökhan Keser 2, Pamir Atagündüz 3, Fehmi Tabak 4, Işık Atagündüz 5, Servet Kayhan COVID-19 infection has a heterogenous disease course; it may be asymptomatic or causes only mild symptoms in the majority of the cases, while immunologic complications such as macrophage activation syndrome also known as secondary hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis, resulting in cytokine storm syndrome and acute respiratory distress syndrome, may […]

In the lab, scientists identify possible COVID-19 treatment

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Authors: St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital The COVID-19 pandemic continues to cause significant illness and death while treatment options remain limited. St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists have discovered a potential strategy to prevent life-threatening inflammation, lung damage and organ failure in patients with COVID-19. The research appeared online in the journal Cell. The scientists identified […]

Accumulating evidence suggests anti-TNF therapy needs to be given trial priority in COVID-19 treatment

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Authors: Philip C Robinson, Duncan Richards, Helen L Tanner, Marc Feldmann The COVID-19 pandemic continues to wreak havoc on global health-care systems and to claim an increasing number of lives. Although some treatments have shown promise, including dexamethasone and remdesivir, problems remain with access to medication and high mortality despite treatment. Patient selection also appears […]

TNF Biologics and COVID-19: What Autoimmune Patients Need to Know

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Authors: If you’re taking a type of medication known as tumor necrosis factor inhibitors, also called anti-TNF or TNFis, you may be wondering how these drugs could impact your chances of contracting COVID-19, or having more severe complications from it. After all, the common cold or other upper respiratory tract infections can be more common […]

Pathways in the Pathophysiology of Coronavirus 19 Lung Disease Accessible to Prevention and Treatment

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Authors: Michael Eisenhut 1, Jae Il Shin 2 Background: In COVID 19 related lung disease, which is a leading cause of death from this disease, cytokines like tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF alpha) may be pivotal in the pathogenesis. TNF alpha reduces fluid absorption due to impairment of sodium and chloride transport required for building an osmotic gradient across epithelial […]

Integrative clinical, genomics and metabolomics data analysis for mainstream precision medicine to investigate COVID-19

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Authors: Zeeshan Ahmed, Saman Zeeshan, David J Foran, Lawrence C Kleinman, Fredric E Wondisford,  XinQi Dong Crrespondence to Dr Zeeshan Ahmed, Rutgers Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey 08901, USA; zahmed@ifh.rutgers.edu Despite significant scientific and medical discoveries, the genetics of novel infectious diseases like COVID-19 remains far from understanding. SARS-CoV-2 […]

8 tools that helped us tackle the coronavirus

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Authors: Ryan Cross , Laura Howes , Megha Satyanarayana ADENOVIRAL VECTORS Viruses might be nature’s most efficient gene-delivery vehicles. At its essence, a virus is simply a package that shuttles genes into a host cell, which it then hijacks to make more viruses. About 4 decades ago, scientists started hijacking the viruses themselves in an attempt to make novel vaccines. The […]

Genomics study identifies routes of transmission of coronavirus in care homes

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Authors: Craig Brierley, University of Cambridge Genomic surveillance—using information about genetic differences between virus samples—can help identify how SARS-CoV-2 spreads in care home settings, whose residents are at particular risk, according to new research published today. Care homes are at high risk of experiencing outbreaks of COVID-19, the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2. Older people and those […]

How genomic epidemiology is tracking the spread of COVID-19 locally and globally

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Auhors: Claire Jarvis, special to C&EN n early April, a paper published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) raised the eyebrows of a number of genomic epidemiologists. It suggested that there were three distinct variants of the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, spreading in different regions of the […]