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Targeting SARS‐CoV‐2 viral proteases as a therapeutic strategy to treat COVID‐19
Author(s) -
Anirudhan Varada,
Lee Hyun,
Cheng Han,
Cooper Laura,
Rong Lijun
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
journal of medical virology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.782
H-Index - 121
eISSN - 1096-9071
pISSN - 0146-6615
DOI - 10.1002/jmv.26814
Subject(s) - virology , coronavirus , proteases , middle east respiratory syndrome , covid-19 , outbreak , protease , middle east respiratory syndrome coronavirus , severe acute respiratory syndrome , betacoronavirus , coronaviridae , biology , virus , medicine , disease , infectious disease (medical specialty) , enzyme , biochemistry , pathology
The 21st century has witnessed three outbreaks of coronavirus (CoVs) infections caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)‐CoV, Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS)‐CoV, and SARS‐CoV‐2. Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19), caused by SARS‐CoV‐2, spreads rapidly and since the discovery of the first COVID‐19 infection in December 2019, has caused 1.2 million deaths worldwide and 226,777 deaths in the United States alone. The high amino acid similarity between SARS‐CoV and SARS‐CoV‐2 viral proteins supports testing therapeutic molecules that were designed to treat SARS infections during the 2003 epidemic. In this review, we provide information on possible COVID‐19 treatment strategies that act via inhibition of the two essential proteins of the virus, 3C‐like protease (3CL pro ) or papain‐like protease (PL pro ).