A new mouse model is laying the groundwork for antivirals, vaccines and antibodies in the fight against COVID-19. In some cases, the model is the first to show these medical countermeasures work in a living organism.

Researchers, among them virologists and microbiologists at UNC-Chapel Hill’s Gillings School of Global Public Health, describe the mouse-adapted SARS-CoV-2 model in a paper fast-tracked and published Aug. 27 in Nature.

Small animal models that replicate SARS-CoV-2 are desperately needed to rapidly evaluate medical countermeasures. The mouse model developed in the laboratory of virologist Ralph Baric has already been used to accelerate the development of Operation Warp Speed vaccines such as those by Moderna.

The model is expected to have a positive impact on the development of antivirals, vaccines and antibodies for the fight against COVID-19, which has risen to 5.7 million cases in the U.S. and continues to be widespread in some communities.

In January, as scientists began gearing up to research the dangerous new illness, all eyes were on ACE2, a protein that sits on the surface of many types of cells in the human body including the heart, gut, lungs and inside the nose. SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, latches on to ACE2 receptor and uses it to enter cells and begin growing, leading to infection.

But it was discovered that SARS-CoV-2 cannot use the mouse version of the viral receptor ACE2. The Baric laboratory has a history of generating mouse models of other coronaviruses, such as SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV, so the team used their expertise to adapt SARS-CoV2 to use the mouse receptor.

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Materials provided by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.