Viruses, Vol. 11, Pages 176: Identification of Broad-Spectrum Antiviral Compounds by Targeting Viral Entry

Viruses, Vol. 11, Pages 176: Identification of Broad-Spectrum Antiviral Compounds by Targeting Viral Entry Viruses doi: 10.3390/v11020176 Authors: Michela Mazzon Ana Maria Ortega-Prieto Douglas Imrie Christin Luft Lena Hess Stephanie Czieso Joe Grove Jessica Katy Skelton Laura Farleigh Joachim J. Bugert Edward Wright Nigel Temperton Richard Angell Sally Oxenford Michael Jacobs Robin Ketteler Marcus Dorner Mark Marsh Viruses are a major threat to human health and economic well-being. In recent years Ebola, Zika, influenza, and chikungunya virus epidemics have raised awareness that infections can spread rapidly before vaccines or specific antagonists can be made available. Broad-spectrum antivirals are drugs with the potential to inhibit infection by viruses from different groups or families, which may be deployed during outbreaks when specific diagnostics, vaccines or directly acting antivirals are not available. While pathogen-directed approaches are generally effective against a few closely related viruses, targeting cellular pathways used by multiple viral agents can have broad-spectrum efficacy. Virus entry, particularly clathrin-mediated endocytosis, constitutes an attractive target as it is used by many viruses. Using a phenotypic screening strategy where the inhibitory activity of small molecules was sequentially tested against different viruses, we identified 12 compounds with broad-spectrum activity, and found a subset blockin...
Source: Viruses - Category: Virology Authors: Tags: Article Source Type: research