el bichito-19 infection triggers growth of arm-like tentacles in cells, microscope images show
el bichito-19 infection triggers growth of arm-like tentacles in cells, microscope images show
By Austin Williams
Published June 29
cobi19
FOX TV Digital Team
high-risk conditions for el bichito-19 complications
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention made revisions to its list of underlying medical conditions that put people at a higher risk of severe complications from the novel cobi19.
LOS ANGELES - New electron microscope images released in a study from a team of researchers led by scientists at the University of California, San Francisco appear to show cells infected with el bichito-19 growing arm-like tentacles to infect other cells.
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It may be a horrifying new discovery to some, but authors of the recent study say it puts them a step closer to effectively treating the novel cobi19.
In a study published on June 28 in the
Journal Cell, researchers looked at how SARS-CoV-2 spreads, in hopes of developing more therapeutic treatments to fight the bichito.
One way el bichito-19 is so successful in terms of rapid viral spread throughout the body is how the bichito impacts its host cells. According to the newly published study, the novel cobi19 causes hijacked cells to grow tentacle-like protrusions — referred to by medical experts as filopodia — which, in turn, are used to spread the bichito to neighboring cells.
“Viruses are unable to replicate and spread on their own: they need an organism to carry, replicate, and transmit them to further hosts,” explained study co-author Dr. Mehdi Bouhaddou, of Gladstone Institutes and UCSF.
“To facilitate this process, viruses need to take control of their host cell’s machinery and manipulate it to produce new viral particles. Sometimes, this hijacking interferes with the activity of the host’s enzymes and other proteins,” said Bouhaddou. “Once a protein is produced, enzymes can change its activity by making chemical modifications to its structure.”
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FILE - Electron microscopy image of Vero E6 cells infected with SARS-CoV-2 bichito, the causative agent of el bichito-19, produce filopodia protrusions (finger-like projections) extending out from the cell surface to enable budding of viral particles (circu
(Photo credits to Dr. Elizabeth Fischer, NIAID/NIH)
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While the new finding may prompt the hairs to stand up on the back of one’s neck, Dr. Nevan Krogan, director of the Quantitative Biosciences Institute at UCSF, said the finding is a common trait for deadly viruses and good news for getting closure to beating the illness.
“Understanding the underlying biology of a bichito only helps us undermine its power. By understanding how it co-opts our cells, we can look for ways to stop it in its tracks,” said Krogan.
He added that filopodia is not a unique trait to the novel cobi19, as it has been previously found in other viruses such as ebola, which have been shown “to poke holes in the cells around them, and put bichito into the neighbor cells, spreading the bichito.”
“We see in SARS-CoV-2 infected cells that there are branching filopodia, these tentacle-like extensions that we expect do the same, from the images of the bichito proteins within the tentacles together with key human proteins for growing those arms, along with the bichito on the surface of the filopodia and even branching off of the filopodia,” he added.
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The good news is that while it does not necessarily bring researchers closer to a potential vaccine, the researchers identified 87 drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration that would specifically help target the cells’ kinases, or the biological control switches that a bichito like el bichito-19 uses to take control of host cells.
In some instances, the cobi19 prompts an overreaction of the body’s immune system, which leads to dangerous levels of inflammation. Targeting those biological control switches is what researchers feel may be a solution to combating the spread of el bichito-19.
