Led by associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin), Jason McLellan, researchers from the UT Austin and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have developed a way to create a 3D model of the 2019 novel coronavirus and map the part of the virus that attacks human cells. The results of the study are published in the February 19th edition of the journal, Science.
The part of the virus that causes all the trouble is called the “spike protein.” Being able to map the spike protein is a critical step in researchers developing vaccines to fight the virus. McLellan has spent years studying other coronaviruses like SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV and had already developed a way to lock the spike protein into a shape that made it easier to analyze.
Says McLellan, “As soon as we knew this was a coronavirus, we felt we had to jump at it because we could be one of the first ones to get this structure. We knew exactly what mutations to put into this because we’ve already shown these mutations work for a bunch of other coronaviruses.”
McLellan and his team are now setting their sights on being able to isolate antibodies from patients infected with the novel coronavirus and using those antibodies to help treat others as soon as they’re infected.