ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: The baculovirus expression vector system has been developed for expressing a wide range of proteins, including enzymes, glycoproteins, recombinant viruses, and vaccines. The availability of the SARS-CoV-2 genome sequence has enabled the synthesis of SARS-CoV2 proteins in a baculovirus-insect cell platform for various applications. The most cloned SARS-CoV-2 protein is the spike protein, which plays a critical role in SARS-CoV-2 infection. It is available in its whole length or as subunits like S1 or the receptor-binding domain (RBD). Non-structural proteins (Nsps), another recombinant SARS-CoV-2 protein generated by the baculovirus expression vector system (BEV), are used in the identification of new medications or the repurposing of existing therapies for the treatment of COVID-19. Non-SARS-CoV-2 proteins generated by BEV for SARS-CoV-2 diagnosis or treatment include moloney murine leukemia virus reverse transcriptase (MMLVRT), angiotensin converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), therapeutic proteins, and recombinant antibodies. The recombinant proteins were modified to boost the yield or to stabilize the protein. CONCLUSION: This review covers the wide application of the recombinant protein produced using the baculovirus expression technology for COVID-19 research. A lot of improvements have been made to produce functional proteins with high yields. However, there is still room for improvement and there are parts of this field of research that have not been investigated yet.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Stevens-Johnson Syndrome , COVID-19/complications , Humans , SARS-CoV-2 , Stevens-Johnson Syndrome/diagnosisABSTRACT
The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has taken the world into turmoil by surprise. The rapid spreading of this virus has led to an exponential increase in the number of cases. It has created a public health disaster, causing a collapse of the health system in every part of the world. Many sectors in the health area are affected, including histopathology services. The challenges and risk of viral transmission can come from various aspects and levels. For COVID-19 tests, there are even cases of no direct contact with the specimens; the specimens received infection from individuals of unknown status. The fixatives used for histopathology specimens are believed to be inactivated viruses, which can be an inactivate coronavirus. Even so, precautions have to be put in place to prevent the spread of infection to laboratory personnel, especially to those handling underfixed and fresh frozen cytology samples. Precautions must also be taken when dealing with histopathology services, by wearing full personal protective equipment and by executing other standard safety measures. The purpose of this review is to highlight the challenges faced in managing histopathology services in our centre during the COVID-19 pandemic.