The Concept of Repurposing in COVID-19 Infection

The strategy of drug repurposing has been proved successful in response to the current corona-virus pandemic, with remdesivir becoming the first drug of choice, an antiviral drug approved for the treatment of COVID-19. In parallel to this, several drugs, such as antimalarial, corticosteroids, and antibi-otics, like azithromycin, are used to treat the severe condition of hospitalized COVID-19 patients, while clinical testing of additional therapeutic drugs, including vaccines, is going on. It is reasonably expected that this review article will deliver optimized and specific curative tools that will increase the attentive-ness of health systems to the probable outlook of epidemics in the future. This review focuses on the ap-plication of repurposed drugs by studying their structure, pharmacokinetic study, different mechanisms of action, and Covid-19 guidelines, which can potentially influence SARS-CoV-2. For most of the drugs, direct clinical evidence regarding their effectiveness in the treatment of COVID-19 is missing. Future clinical trial studies may conclude that one of these can be more potential to inhibit the progression of COVID-19.Copyright © 2022 Bentham Science Publishers.

Ayurvedic Herbs and Spices: A Promising Approach for the Treatment of COVID-19

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is a novel coronavirus accountable for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) that has led to many fatal cases worldwide. It causes a severe acute respiratory syndrome, a hyperinflammatory response, vascular damage, mi-croangiopathy, and widespread thrombosis. Vaccines, interferon therapies, and small-molecule drugs may be among the various alternatives for managing or preventing emerging SARS-CoV-2 infections. New interventions, on the other hand, are likely to take months to years to develop. Furthermore, existing antiviral agents commonly develop viral resistance along with certain side effects. Therefore, effective prevention and treatment medications without side effects against human coronavirus are urgently needed. Indian and Chinese traditional medicine have suggested some natural products for the prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation of the diseases, including COVID-19 and various herbs and mushrooms that have been reported to possess potential antiviral and anti-inflammatory activities. Therefore, in this pandemic, traditional medicines pose a ray of hope for human health. The Ministry of Ayush, India, has also recommended a number of therapies to increase immunity in addition to ayurvedic treatments. Thus, the probability of naturally occurring substances as successful treatments against COVID-19 may seem hopeful due to their diverse biological and therapeutic properties. This review focuses on the latest updates of Ayurvedic herbs and spices as promising approaches for treatment during this devastating pandemic situation.Copyright © 2023 Bentham Science Publishers.

Molecular Markers of Blood Cell Populations Can Help Estimate Aging of the Immune System.

Aging of the immune system involves functional changes in individual cell populations, in hematopoietic tissues and at the systemic level. They are mediated by factors produced by circulating cells, niche cells, and at the systemic level. Age-related alterations in the microenvironment of the bone marrow and thymus cause a decrease in the production of naive immune cells and functional immunodeficiencies. Another result of aging and reduced tissue immune surveillance is the accumulation of senescent cells. Some viral infections deplete adaptive immune cells, increasing the risk of autoimmune and immunodeficiency conditions, leading to a general degradation in the specificity and effectiveness of the immune system in old age. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the state-of-the-art application of mass spectrometry, multichannel flow cytometry, and single-cell genetic analysis have provided vast data on the mechanisms of aging of the immune system. These data require systematic analysis and functional verification. In addition, the prediction of age-related complications is a priority task of modern medicine in the context of the increase in the aged population and the risk of premature death during epidemics. In this review, based on the latest data, we discuss the mechanisms of immune aging and highlight some cellular markers as indicators of age-related immune disbalance that increase the risk of senile diseases and infectious complications.

ADP-Ribosylation and Antiviral Resistance in Plants.

ADP-ribosylation (ADPRylation) is a versatile posttranslational modification in eukaryotic cells which is involved in the regulation of a wide range of key biological processes, including DNA repair, cell signalling, programmed cell death, growth and development and responses to biotic and abiotic stresses. Members of the poly(ADP-ribosyl) polymerase (PARP) family play a central role in the process of ADPRylation. Protein targets can be modified by adding either a single ADP-ribose moiety (mono(ADP-ribosyl)ation; MARylation), which is catalysed by mono(ADP-ribosyl) transferases (MARTs or PARP "monoenzymes"), or targets may be decorated with chains of multiple ADP-ribose moieties (PARylation), via the activities of PARP "polyenzymes". Studies have revealed crosstalk between PARylation (and to a lesser extent, MARylation) processes in plants and plant-virus interactions, suggesting that these tight links may represent a novel factor regulating plant antiviral immunity. From this perspective, we go through the literature linking PARylation-associated processes with other plant regulation pathways controlling virus resistance. Once unraveled, these links may serve as the basis of innovative strategies to improve crop resistance to viruses under challenging environmental conditions which could mitigate yield losses.

Critical View on the Importance of Host Defense Strategies on Virus Distribution of Bee Viruses: What Can We Learn from SARS-CoV-2 Variants?

Bees, both wild and domesticated ones, are hosts to a plethora of viruses, with most of them infecting a wide range of bee species and genera. Although viral discovery and research on bee viruses date back over 50 years, the last decade is marked by a surge of new studies, new virus discoveries, and reports on viral transmission in and between bee species. This steep increase in research on bee viruses was mainly initiated by the global reports on honeybee colony losses and the worldwide wild bee decline, where viruses are regarded as one of the main drivers. While the knowledge gained on bee viruses has significantly progressed in a short amount of time, we believe that integration of host defense strategies and their effect on viral dynamics in the multi-host viral landscape are important aspects that are currently still missing. With the large epidemiological dataset generated over the last two years on the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the role of these defense mechanisms in shaping viral dynamics has become eminent. Integration of these dynamics in a multi-host system would not only greatly aid the understanding of viral dynamics as a driver of wild bee decline, but we believe bee pollinators and their viruses provide an ideal system to study the multi-host viruses and their epidemiology.