Before vaccines were available in the first years of the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers had engineered antibodies that could block SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the disease, to prevent infection or reduce the severity of illness. But as the virus evolved, these drugs stopped working. Antibodies work by binding specific sites on the virus. Antibiotic resistance arises when mutation causes those sites to change.
Biochemist Tyler Starr, PhD, has been searching for an antibody that the virus can’t escape. Starr and collaborators at Vir Biotechnology and the University of Washington have developed an antibody that tolerates variability in its target region, allowing it to tightly bind SARS-CoV-2 and dozens of related viruses. The group is the first to show that a monoclonal antibody can be both potent and active against a broad range of SARS-related coronaviruses. That antibody neutralized every SARS-CoV-2 variant the team tested. It was equally effective at stopping dozens of related coronaviruses that infect bats, but not humans. The results indicate that the antibody could be useful if, in the future, another SARS-related virus evolves the ability to infect humans.
References:
A potent pan-sarbecovirus neutralizing antibody resilient to epitope diversification. Rosen LE, Tortorici MA, De Marco A, et al. Cell. 2024;187(25):7196-7213.e26.
