{"id":652,"date":"2021-10-11T07:39:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-11T05:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.blogs.yokogawa.de\/life-innovation\/2021\/10\/11\/virus-entry-sars-cov-2\/"},"modified":"2022-07-21T11:46:11","modified_gmt":"2022-07-21T09:46:11","slug":"virus-entry-sars-cov-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yokogawa.com\/eu\/blog\/life-innovation\/virus-entry-sars-cov-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Host cell entry of SARS-CoV-2 and Influenza virus"},"content":{"rendered":"

This blog post highlights the COVID-19 and influenza virus research of MD Ph.D. Yohei Yamauchi and his working group, University of Bristol, United Kingdom. Their main focus is exploring virus entry.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Focusing on Virus Entry<\/h2>\n

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\"Virus
MD Ph.D. Yohei Yamauchi in his tissue culture lab at the University of Bristol<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Our group uses automated microscopy and quantitative image analysis to understand how human viruses that cause disease such as influenza A virus (IAV) and SARS-CoV-2 (the causative agent of COVID-19) enter, infect and replicate inside the cells in our body. There are over 700 trillion cells in the human body, some of which can be infected with a pathogenic virus and cause disease. In particular, we are curious about \u201cvirus entry\u201d – a stepwise process that involves discrete interactions between the incoming virus particle with a cell. The size of a single virus compared to a single cell, is similar to that of a football compared to a football pitch.<\/p>\n

Challenges in virus research<\/h2>\n

There are more viruses than stars in the universe, and over 200 virus species are known to infect humans. Viruses come in various shapes and sizes, but they have one thing in common \u2013 they depend on cellular functions to survive and reproduce. What if there are universal mechanisms of virus interactions with the host? Then we can take advantage of such \u201cinteractions\u201d and target them by antiviral strategies. However, the challenge is to understand virus-host cell interactions at a mechanistic level because they can be transient and hard to detect. Microscopy is a great tool to tackle these questions.<\/p>\n

Using CellVoyager CQ1 to explore virus entry<\/h2>\n
\"virus
CQ1 set up in the Yamauchi group. Shown on the screen is SARS-CoV-2-induced syncytia (cell-cell fusion) in human cell culture models of viral infection. Green; SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein, Blue; nucleus.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In our group, we use the Yokogawa CQ1 to capture viral and cellular protein expression in cell culture using imaging plates. These are mostly done using 96-well optical plates. The cells are typically treated with drugs, siRNAs, CRISPR\/Cas9, etc. to block a cellular gene or function. The cells are infected with a virus and the infection phenotype (reduction or increase) is imaged at different stages of infection, followed by automated image analysis supported by machine learning. In our lab, we have established image-based assays to quantitate each and every step of virus entry.<\/p>\n

Examples of these steps are:<\/p>\n