Evaluation of glycan-based antiviral compounds against pandemic viruses

A main challenge with viruses that cause infections, diseases, outbreaks and pandemics in humans is that we lack efficient antiviral drugs.

Importantly, antiviral drugs do not only limit disease and prevent death but they also limit viral replication in infected individuals and thereby also break transmission, which has been the main problem with the ongoing covid-19 pandemic.

We have previously developed sialic acid-based compounds against sialic acid-binding adenovirus and coxsackievirus that cause severe eye infections.

One of these compounds was evaluated in phase I and II clinical trials as a tropical treatment against epidemic keratoconjunctivitis, a severe and contagious ocular infection caused by sialic acid-binding adenoviruses.

Sialic acids are monosaccharides expressed on human cells where they are used as receptors by many viruses, but they are also present in mucosa, where they serve as a decoy receptors and act as a barrier to invading viruses.

The main aim of this research proposal is to i) evaluate the inhibitory effect of an in-house-generated library of sialic acid-based/derived compounds against respiratory, influenza A virus and coronavirus in vitro, in regular cell lines and ii) evaluate the inhibitory effect of selected compounds in an advanced, 3D-organoid, respiratory model of the human airways.