Highly Efficient and Rapid Inactivation of Coronavirus on Non-Metal Hydrophobic Laser-Induced Graphene in Mild Conditions.

The prevalence of COVID-19 has caused global dysfunction in terms of public health, sustainability, and socio-economy. While vaccination shows potential in containing the spread, the development of surfaces that effectively reduces virus transmission and infectivity is also imperative, especially amid the early stage of the pandemic. However, most virucidal surfaces are operated under harsh conditions, making them impractical or potentially unsafe for long-term use. Here, it is reported that laser-induced graphene (LIG) without any metal additives shows marvelous antiviral capacities for coronavirus. Under low solar irradiation, the virucidal efficacy of the hydrophobic LIG (HLIG) against HCoV-OC43 and HCoV-229E can achieve 97.5% and 95%, respectively. The photothermal effect and the hydrophobicity of the HLIG synergistically contribute to the superior inactivation capacity. The stable antiviral performance of HLIG enables its multiple uses, showing advantages in energy saving and environmental protection. This work discloses a potential method for antiviral applications and has implications for the future development of antiviral materials.

Close relatives of MERS-CoV in bats use ACE2 as their functional receptors.

Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) and several bat coronaviruses use dipeptidyl peptidase-4 (DPP4) as an entry receptor1-4. However, the receptor for NeoCoV-the closest known MERS-CoV relative found in bats-remains unclear5. Here, using a pseudotype virus entry assay, we found that NeoCoV and its close relative, PDF-2180, can efficiently bind to and use specific bat angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) orthologues and, less favourably, human ACE2 as entry receptors through their receptor-binding domains (RBDs) on the spike (S) proteins. Cryo-electron microscopy analysis revealed an RBD-ACE2 binding interface involving protein-glycan interactions, distinct from those of other known ACE2-using coronaviruses. We identified residues 337-342 of human ACE2 as a molecular determinant restricting NeoCoV entry, whereas a NeoCoV S pseudotyped virus containing a T510F RBD mutation efficiently entered cells expressing human ACE2. Although polyclonal SARS-CoV-2 antibodies or MERS-CoV RBD-specific nanobodies did not cross-neutralize NeoCoV or PDF-2180, an ACE2-specific antibody and two broadly neutralizing betacoronavirus antibodies efficiently inhibited these two pseudotyped viruses. We describe MERS-CoV-related viruses that use ACE2 as an entry receptor, underscoring a promiscuity of receptor use and a potential zoonotic threat.

Isoquinolinium-based photosensitizers with aggregation-induced emission characteristics for highly efficient photodynamic combat of viruses

Because of the prevalence of COVID-19, people are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of disinfection, which necessitates the development of convenient and efficient methods for inactivating pathogens. In this work, we report the application of three isoquinolinium-based aggregation-induced-emission-active photosensitizers (PSs) for photodynamic inactivation (PDI) of viruses at a low light intensity of 9 mW cm(-2). These three PSs could highly efficiently sensitize the production of reactive oxygen species and are applied to PDI of viruses. Their inactivation effects on viruses are evaluated by checking the cytopathic effect through examining the morphology of their host cells, investigating their protein expression in host cells by Western blot, immunofluorescence imaging of the viral proteins in host cells, quantifying the viral RNA levels after infection, and viral titering-median tissue culture infectious dose (TCID50) assay. The experimental results obtained clearly demonstrate the excellent PDI effect of these three PSs on viruses. Besides, we also explore the feasibility of employing these PSs for PDI of viruses on simulated high-touch surfaces, such as stainless steel and glass slides, on which these PSs demonstrate an even better PDI effect on all the three tested viruses. The PDI method described in this work is expected to innovate the disinfection practice in public areas.

Research of the Changes in the Psychological Status of Chinese University Students and the Influencing Factors During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Background: Psychological dynamics of college students have changed during the COVID-19 outbreak but little research has been done in this area. The purpose of this study is to investigate the dynamic changes in the mental health status of college students since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic 1 year and the influencing factors. Methods: The research period was from February 2020 to August 2021. 384 college students were analyzed three times during this period on the recognition and psychological state of the pandemic. Results: During the period from February 2020 to August 2021, in general, the positive scores rose from 20.79 to 23.46, while the negative scores dropped from 17.41 to 14.00. The regression analysis results on the influencing factors showed the degree of recognition of the pandemic is all significant in the three phases (p < 0.05). Conclusion: With the effective control of the pandemic, the mental state of the students showed a slight improvement in the environment of sporadic cases. Behavior has a partial mediating effect between the source of fear and psychological changes. Correct behavior guidance can effectively reduce the psychological changes caused by college students' fear.

Evolution analysis of online topics based on ‘word-topic’ coupling network

Analyzing topic evolution is an effective way to monitor the overview of topic spreading. Existing methods have focused either on the intensity evolution of topics along a timeline or the topic evolution path of technical literature. In this paper, we aim to study topic evolution from a micro perspective, which not only captures the topic timeline but also reveals the topic status and the directed evolutionary path among topics. Firstly, we construct a word network by co-occurrence relationship between feature words. Secondly, Latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA) model is used to automatically extract topics and capture the mapping relationship between words and topics, and then a ‘word-topic’ coupling network is built. Thirdly, based on the ‘word-topic’ coupling network, we describe the topic intensity evolution over time and measure topic status considering the contribution of feature words to a topic. The concept of topic drifting probability is proposed to identify the evolutionary path. Experimental results conducted on two real-world data sets of “COVID-19” demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed method.

Sera Metabolomics Characterization of Patients at Different Stages in Wuhan Identifies Critical Biomarkers of COVID-19.

We have witnessed the 2-year-long global rampage of COVID-19 caused by the wide spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). However, knowledge about biomarkers of the entire COVID-19 process is limited. Identification of the systemic features of COVID-19 will lead to critical biomarkers and therapeutic targets for early intervention and clinical disease course prediction. Here, we performed a comprehensive analysis of clinical measurements and serum metabolomics in 199 patients with different stages of COVID-19. In particular, our study is the first serum metabolomic analysis of critical rehabilitation patients and critical death patients. We found many differential metabolites in the comparison of metabolomic results between ordinary, severe, and critical patients and uninfected patients. Through the metabolomic results of COVID-19 patients in various stages, and critical rehabilitation patients and critical death patients, we identified a series of differential metabolites as biomarkers, a separate queue and precise distinction, and predicted COVID-19 verification. These differentially expressed metabolites, included 1,2-di-(9Z,12Z-octadecadienoyl)-sn-glycero-3-phosphate, propylparaben, 20-hydroxyeicosatetraenoic acid, triethanolamine, chavicol, disialosyl galactosyl globoside, 1-arachidonoylglycerophosphoinositol, and alpha-methylstyrene, all of which have been identified for the first time as biomarkers in COVID-19 progression. These biomarkers are involved in many pathological and physiological pathways of COVID-19, for example, immune responses, platelet degranulation, and metabolism which might result in pathogenesis. Our results showed valuable information about metabolites obviously altered in COVID-19 patients with different stages, which could shed light on the pathogenesis as well as serve as potential therapeutic agents of COVID-19.

Molecular Engineering of Laser-Induced Graphene for Potential-Driven Broad-Spectrum Antimicrobial and Antiviral Applications.

Worldwide, countless deaths have been caused by the coronavirus disease 2019. In addition to the virus variants, an increasing number of fatal fungal infections have been reported, which further exacerbates the scenario. Therefore, the development of porous surfaces with both antiviral and antimicrobial capacities is of urgent need. Here, a cost-effective, nontoxic, and metal-free strategy is reported for the surface engineering of laser-induced graphene (LIG). The authors covalently engineer the surface potential of the LIG from -14 to ≈+35 mV (LIG+ ), enabling both high-efficiency antimicrobial and antiviral performance under mild conditions. Specifically, several candidate microorganisms of different types, including Escherichia coli, Streptomyces tenebrarius, and Candida albicans, are almost completely inactivated after 10-min solar irradiation. LIG+ also exhibits a strong antiviral effect against human coronaviruses: 99% HCoV-OC43 and 100% HCoV-229E inactivation are achieved after 20-min treatment. Such enhancement may also be observed against other types of pathogens that are heat-sensitive and oppositely charged. Besides, the covalent modification strategy alleviates the leaching problem, and the low cytotoxicity of LIG+ makes it advantageous. This study highlights the synergy of surface potential and photothermal effect in the inactivation of pathogens and it provides a direction for designing porous materials for airborne disease removal and water disinfection.

Photosensitizers: A Membrane-Targeting Photosensitizer with Aggregation-Induced Emission Characteristics for Highly Efficient Photodynamic Combat of Human Coronaviruses (Small 30/2021)

Lianrong Wang, Engui Zhao, Sijie Chen and co-workers (article number 2101770) develop a novel membrane-targeting photosensitizer (DTTPB) with aggregation-induced emission characteristics for efficient photodynamic inactivation of human coronaviruses. DTTPB can bind to the envelope of human coronaviruses and sensitize the production of reactive oxygen species, which can effectively inactivate human coronaviruses upon white-light irradiation.

A Membrane-Targeting Photosensitizer with Aggregation-Induced Emission Characteristics for Highly Efficient Photodynamic Combat of Human Coronaviruses.

COVID-19 pandemic, caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, has resulted in global social and economic disruption, putting the world economy to the largest global recession since the Great Depression. To control the spread of COVID-19, cutting off the transmission route is a critical step. In this work, the efficient inactivation of human coronavirus with photodynamic therapy (PDT) by employing photosensitizers with aggregation-induced emission characteristics (DTTPB) is reported. DTTPB is designed to bear a hydrophilic head and two hydrophobic tails, mimicking the structure of phospholipids on biological membranes. DTTPB demonstrates a broad absorption band covering the whole visible light range and high molar absorptivity, as well as excellent reactive oxygen species sensitizing ability, making it an excellent candidate for PDT. Besides, DTTPB can target membrane structure, and bind to the envelope of human coronaviruses. Upon light irradiation, DTTPB demonstrates highly effective antiviral behavior: human coronavirus treated with DTTPB and white-light irradiation can be efficiently inactivated with complete loss of infectivity, as revealed by the significant decrease of virus RNA and proteins in host cells. Thus, DTTPB sensitized PDT can efficiently prevent the infection and the spread of human coronavirus, which provides a new avenue for photodynamic combating of COVID-19.

Laser-Induced Graphene: Highly Efficient and Rapid Inactivation of Coronavirus on Non-Metal Hydrophobic Laser-Induced Graphene in Mild Conditions (Adv. Funct. Mater. 24/2021)

In article number 2101195 Chao Shen, Ben Zhong Tang, Ruquan Ye, and co-workers report a hydrophobic laser-induced graphene (HLIG) that enables effective inactivation of coronavirus in mild conditions from the synergy of photothermal effect and hydrophobicity. The non-metal HLIG achieves a 97.5% and 95% virucidal efficacy for HCoV-OC43 and HCoV-229E in 15 min under low-grade energy usage. Additionally, the low cytotoxicity and high stability of HLIG further make it a powerful material for disinfection.

Coinfection with influenza A virus enhances SARS-CoV-2 infectivity.

The upcoming flu season in the Northern Hemisphere merging with the current COVID-19 pandemic raises a potentially severe threat to public health. Through experimental coinfection with influenza A virus (IAV) and either pseudotyped or live SARS-CoV-2 virus, we found that IAV preinfection significantly promoted the infectivity of SARS-CoV-2 in a broad range of cell types. Remarkably, in vivo, increased SARS-CoV-2 viral load and more severe lung damage were observed in mice coinfected with IAV. Moreover, such enhancement of SARS-CoV-2 infectivity was not observed with several other respiratory viruses, likely due to a unique feature of IAV to elevate ACE2 expression. This study illustrates that IAV has a unique ability to aggravate SARS-CoV-2 infection, and thus, prevention of IAV infection is of great significance during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Literature Analysis of the Efficacy of Arbidol in Virus Infectious Diseases

Arbidol (ARB) is a broad-spectrum antiviral drug. However, its effects on virus infectious diseases remain unclear. We aimed to evaluate the efficacy of ARB in infectious virus diseases. We searched up to March 2020 in MEDLINE (Ovid SP), EMBASE (Ovid SP), Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), for studies investigating ARB in virus infectious diseases. Descriptive analysis was made on the main results of the eligible articles that meet the inclusion criteria. Fifty-two studies were included finally, which involving influenza virus, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronaviruses (SARS-CoV), middle east respiratory syndrome-coronaviruses (MERS-CoV), hepatitis c virus (HCV), herpes simplex virus (HSV), severe acute respiratory syndromes-coronaviruses-2 (SARS-CoV-2), chikungunya virus (CHIKV), hantaan virus (HTNV), zika virus (ZIKV), coxsackievirus, lassa virus(LASV), Ebola virus (EBOV) and adenovirus (ADV). ARB is effective in the above viruses. Two studies showed that ARB was effective in SARS-CoV-2. In vivo and in vitro studies showed ARB had the capability of inhibiting SARS-CoV, MERS-CoV, HCV, HSV, ZIKV, CV, HTNV, ZIKV, CHIKV, LASV, EBOV, and ADV. Conclusion Clinical studies are still needed to confirm the efficacy of ARB in novel coronavirus pneumonia (COVID-19).