ABSTRACT
Nutraceuticals have emerged as potential compounds to attenuate the COVID‐19 complications. Precisely, these food additives strengthen the overall COVID treatment and enhance the immunity of a person. Such compounds have been used at a large scale, in almost every household due to their better affordability and easy access. Therefore, current research is focused on developing newer advanced formulations from potential drug candidates including nutraceuticals with desirable properties viz, affordability, ease of availability, ease of administration, stability under room temperature, and potentially longer shelf‐lives. As such, various nutraceutical‐based products such as compounds could be promising agents for effectively managing COVID‐19 symptoms and complications. Most importantly, regular consumption of such nutraceuticals has been shown to boost the immune system and prevent viral infections. Nutraceuticals such as vitamins, amino acids, flavonoids like curcumin, and probiotics have been studied for their role in the prevention of COVID‐19 symptoms such as fever, pain, malaise, and dry cough. In this review, we have critically reviewed the potential of various nutraceutical‐based therapeutics for the management of COVID‐19. We searched the information relevant to our topic from search engines such as PubMed and Scopus using COVID‐19, nutraceuticals, probiotics, and vitamins as a keyword. Any scientific literature published in a language other than English was excluded. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: Nutraceuticals possess both nutritional values and medicinal properties. They can aid in the prevention and treatment of diseases, as well as promote physical health and the immune system, normalizing body functions, and improving longevity. Recently, nutraceuticals such as probiotics, vitamins, polyunsaturated fatty acids, trace minerals, and medicinal plants have attracted considerable attention and are widely regarded as potential alternatives to current therapeutic options for the effective management of various diseases, including COVID‐19.
ABSTRACT
The pathophysiology of coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) is characterized by worsened inflammation because of weakened immunity, causing the infiltration of immune cells, followed by necrosis. Consequently, these pathophysiological changes may lead to a life-threatening decline in perfusion due to hyperplasia of the lungs, instigating severe pneumonia, and causing fatalities. Additionally, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection can cause mortality due to viral septic shock, resulting from unrestrained and backfiring immune reactions to the pathogen. Sepsis can cause premature organ failure in COVID-19 patients, as well. Notably, vitamin D and its derivatives and minerals, such as zinc and magnesium, have been reported to improve the immune system against respiratory illnesses. This comprehensive review aims to provide updated mechanistic details of vitamin D and zinc as immunomodulators. Additionally, this review also focuses on their role in respiratory illnesses, while specifically delineating the plausibility of employing them as a preventive and therapeutic agent against current and future pandemics from an immunological perspective. Furthermore, this comprehensive review will attract the attention of health professionals, nutritionists, pharmaceuticals, and scientific communities, as it encourages the use of such micronutrients for therapeutic purposes, as well as promoting their health benefits for a healthy lifestyle and wellbeing.
ABSTRACT
Apart from well-known respiratory symptoms, less frequent symptoms also appear as a direct result of COVID-19 infection, or as indirect effects of the recommended quarantine and related lifestyle changes. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on human skin is predominantly focused on in this article. Cutaneous manifestations, including redness, chilblain-like symptoms (COVID toes), hives or urticaria rash, water blisters, and fishing net-like red-blue patterns on the skin, may appear as accompanying or as systemic COVID-19 symptoms with potential lesions at different skin sites. These symptoms were related to skin phototypes and vitamin D deficiency. Moreover, Black, Asian, and minority ethnic origin patients are found to be more sensitive to COVID-19 infection than Caucasians because of vitamin D deficiency. The region of population with lighter skin phototypes have a significantly higher chance to develop cutaneous manifestations than population with dark skin. In addition, adverse effects, such as skin barrier damage and irritation, may also occur due to extensive personal protective equipment usage (e.g., masks, protective suits, and a few others) and predominately alcohol-based sanitizers. This manuscript covers various aspects of COVID-19 and its clinical skin manifestations.
ABSTRACT
Nutraceuticals have emerged as potential compounds to attenuate the COVID-19 complications. Precisely, these food additives strengthen the overall COVID treatment and enhance the immunity of a person. Such compounds have been used at a large scale, in almost every household due to their better affordability and easy access. Therefore, current research is focused on developing newer advanced formulations from potential drug candidates including nutraceuticals with desirable properties viz, affordability, ease of availability, ease of administration, stability under room temperature, and potentially longer shelf-lives. As such, various nutraceutical-based products such as compounds could be promising agents for effectively managing COVID-19 symptoms and complications. Most importantly, regular consumption of such nutraceuticals has been shown to boost the immune system and prevent viral infections. Nutraceuticals such as vitamins, amino acids, flavonoids like curcumin, and probiotics have been studied for their role in the prevention of COVID-19 symptoms such as fever, pain, malaise, and dry cough. In this review, we have critically reviewed the potential of various nutraceutical-based therapeutics for the management of COVID-19. We searched the information relevant to our topic from search engines such as PubMed and Scopus using COVID-19, nutraceuticals, probiotics, and vitamins as a keyword. Any scientific literature published in a language other than English was excluded. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: Nutraceuticals possess both nutritional values and medicinal properties. They can aid in the prevention and treatment of diseases, as well as promote physical health and the immune system, normalizing body functions, and improving longevity. Recently, nutraceuticals such as probiotics, vitamins, polyunsaturated fatty acids, trace minerals, and medicinal plants have attracted considerable attention and are widely regarded as potential alternatives to current therapeutic options for the effective management of various diseases, including COVID-19.
ABSTRACT
Respiratory diseases contribute to a significant percentage of mortality and morbidity worldwide. The circadian rhythm is a natural biological process where our bodily functions align with the 24 h oscillation (sleep-wake cycle) process and are controlled by the circadian clock protein/gene. Disruption of the circadian rhythm could alter normal lung function. Chronotherapy is a type of therapy provided at specific time intervals based on an individual's circadian rhythm. This would allow the drug to show optimum action, and thereby modulate its pharmacokinetics to lessen unwanted or unintended effects. In this review, we deliberated on the recent advances employed in chrono-targeted therapeutics for chronic respiratory diseases.
ABSTRACT
Biomimetic nanotechnology could serve as an advancement in the domain of drug delivery and diagnosis with the application of natural cell membrane or synthetically-derived membrane nanoparticles (NPs). These biomimetic NPs endow significant therapeutic and diagnostic efficacy by their unique properties, such as immune invasion and better targeting ability. Additionally, these NPs have a unique ability to retain the inherent properties of cell membrane and membrane's intrinsic functionalities, which helps them to exhibit superior therapeutic effects. In this review, we describe how these membrane-clocked NPs endow superior therapeutic effects by immune invasion; along with this, the development of membrane-coated NPs and their method of preparation and characterization has been clearly described in the manuscript. Moreover, Various developed membrane-coated NPs such as red blood cell membrane-coated NPs, white blood cells membrane-coated NPs, platelet membrane coated, cancer cell membrane coated, bacterial membrane vesicles and, mesenchymal stem cells membrane-coated NPs have been established in this manuscript. At last, the discussion on the role of membrane-coated NPs as theranostics, and notably, the literature that demonstrates the shreds of evidences of these NPs in targeting and neutralizing the SARS-CoV-2 virus have also been incorporated.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 Drug Treatment , Nanoparticles , Cell Membrane , Drug Delivery Systems , Humans , SARS-CoV-2ABSTRACT
Currently, there is no specific treatment to cure COVID-19. Many medicinal plants have antiviral, antioxidant, antibacterial, antifungal, anticancer, wound healing etc. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to screen for potent inhibitors of N-terminal domain (NTD) of nucleocapsid phosphoprotein of SARS-CoV-2. The structure of NTD of RNA binding domain of nucleocapsid phosphoprotein of SARS coronavirus 2 was retrieved from the Protein Data Bank (PDB 6VYO) and the structures of 100 different phytocompounds were retrieved from Pubchem. The receptor protein and ligands were prepared using Schrodinger's Protein Preparation Wizard. Molecular docking was done by using the Schrodinger's maestro 12.0 software. Drug likeness and toxicity of active phytocompounds was predicted by using Swiss adme, admetSAR and protox II online servers. Molecular dynamic simulation of the best three protein- ligand complexes (alizarin, aloe-emodin and anthrarufin) was performed to study the interaction stability. We have identified three potential active sites (named as A, B, C) on receptor protein for efficient binding of the phytocompounds. We found that, among 100 phytocompounds, emodin, aloe-emodin, anthrarufin, alizarine, and dantron of Rheum emodi showed good binding affinity at all the three active sites of RNA binding domain of nucleocapsid phosphoprotein of COVID-19.The binding energies of emodin, aloe-emodin, anthrarufin, alizarine, and dantron were -8.299, -8.508, -8.456, -8.441, and -8.322 Kcal mol-1 respectively (site A), -7.714, -6.433, -6.354, -6.598, and -6.99 Kcal mol-1 respectively (site B), and -8.299, 8.508, 8.538, 8.841, and 8.322 Kcal mol-1 respectively (site C). All the active phytocompounds follows the drug likeness properties, non-carcinogenic, and non-toxic. Theses phytocompounds (alone or in combination) could be developed into effective therapy against COVID-19. From MD simulation data, we found that all three complexes of 6VYO with alizarin, aloe-emodin and anthrarufin were stable up to 50 ns. These phytocompounds can be tested further for in vitro or in vivo and used as a potential drug to cure SARS-CoV-2 infection.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.