The now regular emergence of new COVID-19 variants means we have to learn to live with regular COVID-19 outbreaks, similar to other seasonal viral outbreaks, such as influenza. This means that the discovery of drugs that are effective against the virus causing COVID-19 infection is highly desirable.
DisCO (Discovery of COVID-19 inhibitors) is a project funded by the Malta Council for Science and Technology through the Fusion – Infectious Diseases programme and is lead by Jean-Paul Ebejer from the Centre for Molecular Medicine and Biobanking (CMMB) at the University of Malta.
The main effort of this project is to identify compounds that may be potentially used as drugs against COVID-19 infection.
As part of this two-year project, scientists from the University of Malta have used computational tools to identify a number of chemical compounds that could be effective against one of the enzymes of SARS-CoV-2, called Main Protease (Mpro).
This was carried out by first drawing up a list of molecules from the open literature that are reported to be effective against this enzyme, and then use special computer software to identify molecules that are similar to the previously identified molecules. The reasoning being that similar molecules will have similar biological activity. The study has resulted in the identification of 222 molecules that could prove effective against the COVID-19 virus.
Scientists from the University of Malta have used computational tools to identify a number of chemical compounds that could be effective against one of the enzymes of SARS-CoV-2, called Main Protease (Mpro)
In order to assess whether the computational results are actually effective against the target enzyme, the most promising candidates were tested in the laboratory to check how effective they are at inhibiting the enzyme.
Promisingly, around 40 compounds had an effect on the target, with three of the compounds having a strong effect at lower concentrations, making these compounds good candidates for further study and development.
The work undertaken as part of this study is actually the first step, known as ‘virtual screening’, undertaken by pharmaceutical companies as part of their drug discovery pipeline. This is done to improve on the efficiency of resource utilisation. The identified compounds will need further testing and refinement.
The project also built awareness and capacity, locally, in the field of bioinformatics. This capacity building and the research efforts supported by MCST, which are in line with Malta’s Research and Innovation Strategy, are expected to lead to bioinformatics becoming a priority area for Malta.
Tristan Camilleri has an MSc in bioinformatics and is reading for a PhD in the area.
Jean-Paul Ebejer, Byron Baron, and Tristan Camilleri make up the scientific team for the DisCO project.
Sound Bites
• Researchers have trained a robotic ‘chef’ to watch and learn from cooking videos, and recreate the dish itself. The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, programmed their robotic chef with a ‘cookbook’ of eight simple salad recipes. After watching a video of a human demonstrating one of the recipes, the robot was able to identify which recipe was being prepared and make it. In addition, the videos helped the robot incrementally add to its cookbook. At the end of the experiment, the robot came up with a ninth recipe on its own. Their results, reported in the journal IEEE Access, demonstrate how video content can be a valuable and rich source of data for automated food production, and could enable easier and cheaper deployment of robot chefs.
• An AI strategy, proven adept at board games like chess and Go reinforcement learning, has now been adapted for a powerful protein design programme. The results show that reinforcement learning can do more than master board games. When trained to solve long-standing puzzles in protein science, the software excelled at creating useful molecules. In one experiment, proteins made with the new approach were found to be more effective at generating useful antibodies in mice than were previous methods. If this method is applied to the right research problems, it likely could accelerate progress in a variety of scientific fields.
For more soundbites, listen to Radio Mocha every Saturday at 7.30pm on Radju Malta and the following Monday at 9pm on Radju Malta 2 https://www.fb.com/RadioMochaMalta/.
DID YOU KNOW?
• At his home in Hertfordshire, George Bernard Shaw had a writing shed that he called ‘London’, so that unwanted visitors could be told by the staff that he was ‘in London’.
• Due to other countries registering there for tax reasons, Panama has the largest shipping fleet in the world, greater than China’s and the USA’s combined.
• In some species of spider, females are 125 times heavier than males.
• LATCHKEY INCONTINENCE is the sudden need to urinate as soon as you get home.
For more trivia see: www.um.edu.mt/think.