A team led by Jose Onuchic at Rice University and Paul Whitford at Northeastern University, both researchers at the National Science Foundation Physics Frontiers Center at the Center for Theoretical Biological Physics (CTBP) at Rice, has made a discovery in the fight against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus responsible for COVID-19. The team, in partnership with an experimental effort led by Yale University researchers Walter Mothes and Wenwei Li, has uncovered new insights into how the virus infects human cells and how it can be neutralized. Their findings were published in the journal Science on Aug.
15. SARS-CoV-2 uses its spike protein to attach to the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 on human cells, initiating a process that allows it to enter the cell. The spike protein has two main parts: the S1 domain, which varies greatly among different strains of the virus, and the S2 domain, which is highly conserved across different coronaviruses .
This similarity makes the S2 domain a promising target for vaccines and therapies that could work against many virus strains. By combining simulations and theoretical predictions with structural information from their experimental collaborators, including initial and final configurations as well as intermediate states during the viral invasion, the researchers obtained a detailed picture of the infection process at an atomic level. "Understanding these intermediate states of the spike protein creat.