Biomimetic Nanotechnology for SARS-CoV-2 Treatment.

More than 600 million people worldwide have been infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), resulting in the pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). In particular, new waves of COVID-19 caused by emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants pose new health risks to the global population. Nanotechnology has developed excellent solutions to combat the virus pandemic, such as ACE2-based nanodecoys, nanobodies, nanovaccines, and drug nanocarriers. Lessons learned and strategies developed during this battle against SARS-CoV-2 variants may also serve as inspiration for developing nanotechnology-based strategies to combat other global infectious diseases and their variants in the future.

Chapter 21 - Antiviral biomaterials

Viral infection is recognized as a public health burden globally. In recent years, the world has witnessed the constant outbreaks of new viruses such as Zika, Ebola, and SARS-CoV along with frequent mutations of these viruses and the existing antiviral therapies are not variedly sufficient due to low efficacy, drug resistance, and serious adverse effects. Therefore, developing unconventional and alternate methods is the need for an hour. Biomaterial development has emerged as functional therapeutics, especially antiviral biomaterials have attracted researchers due to their unique characteristics and advantages. Biomaterial-based antivirals offer new action mechanisms by inhibiting the differential steps of the viral infectious cycle and synergize the effect by combining with the antiviral or antiinflammatory drugs. The combination of biomaterials and nanotechnology has revolutionized the medical field and augmented its clinical applications. Nanodecoys or nanosponges are used as novel biomaterials that exhibit unique antiviral efficacy with low cytotoxicity. Based on this background, this chapter aims to provide an overview and better understanding of the current knowledge in the arena of antiviral biomaterials. It not only illustrates the multidisciplinary approaches of antiviral biomaterials in terms of applications and recent advancements but also the challenges associated with antiviral biomaterials.

Nanoscale Technologies in the Fight against COVID-19: From Innovative Nanomaterials to Computer-Aided Discovery of Potential Antiviral Plant-Derived Drugs.

The last few years have increasingly emphasized the need to develop new active antiviral products obtained from artificial synthesis processes using nanomaterials, but also derived from natural matrices. At the same time, advanced computational approaches have found themselves fundamental in the repurposing of active therapeutics or for reducing the very long developing phases of new drugs discovery, which represents a real limitation, especially in the case of pandemics. The first part of the review is focused on the most innovative nanomaterials promising both in the field of therapeutic agents, as well as measures to control virus spread (i.e., innovative antiviral textiles). The second part of the review aims to show how computer-aided technologies can allow us to identify, in a rapid and therefore constantly updated way, plant-derived molecules (i.e., those included in terpenoids) potentially able to efficiently interact with SARS-CoV-2 cell penetration pathways.

COVID-19 inflammation and implications in drug delivery.

Growing evidence indicates that hyperinflammatory syndrome and cytokine storm observed in COVID-19 severe cases are narrowly associated with the disease's poor prognosis. Therefore, targeting the inflammatory pathways seems to be a rational therapeutic strategy against COVID-19. Many anti-inflammatory agents have been proposed; however, most of them suffer from poor bioavailability, instability, short half-life, and undesirable biodistribution resulting in off-target effects. From a pharmaceutical standpoint, the implication of COVID-19 inflammation can be exploited as a therapeutic target and/or a targeting strategy against the pandemic. First, the drug delivery systems can be harnessed to improve the properties of anti-inflammatory agents and deliver them safely and efficiently to their therapeutic targets. Second, the drug carriers can be tailored to develop smart delivery systems able to respond to the microenvironmental stimuli to release the anti-COVID-19 therapeutics in a selective and specific manner. More interestingly, some biosystems can simultaneously repress the hyperinflammation due to their inherent anti-inflammatory potency and endow their drug cargo with a selective delivery to the injured sites.