The countdown has begun for the "protective nasal spray medicine" against Covid-19, which was developed by scientists from Bilkent and Hacettepe University. The animal experiments of Covid-19 Spray were successfully completed. After Phase 1 studies of the medicine and trials on volunteers will begin with the approval of the ethics committee. If all goes well, the medicine is planned to be served in December. The spray is expected to be effective against all existing or emerging variants. The medicine has been developed with a protein called Griffithsin (GRFT), will also be the first in the world as a protein-based medicine candidate to block the Sars-Cov2 virus.
Bilkent UNAM Faculty Member and Synthetic Biology Specialist Assoc. Prof. Dr. Urartu Seker has made important statements to Demiroren News Agency (DHA). Seker said that thanks to the GRFT protein of the medicine, it works with a mechanism that can prevent its entry into the cell by binding to many parts of the virus, not to a single point on the virus as in vaccines. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Seker also pointed out that this would be a "preventive medicine", not a vaccine.
"A PROTEIN THAT PREVENTS INSURANCE OF VIRUS INTO THE CELL"
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Seker said, "We are actually working on a protein called GRFT. It is a lectin protein and a protein can bind to sugar groups. There are sugar groups around the virus proteins that cover them as if they were dipped in sugar. In this way, it prevents the virus from entering the cell. "Because the virus cannot enter the cell, it cannot reproduce, and because it cannot reproduce, it cannot cause a serious problem that will cause disease. We conducted the first studies of this research with non-animal experiments, purely cells. When the results we obtained from these experiments showed that the drug could work, we switched to animal experiments," he said.
IT WILL BE THE FIRST PROTEIN-BASED SPRAY MEDICINE IN THE WORLD
Stating that GRFT protein has never been studied so far as a protein-based medicine candidate, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Seker pointed out that this would be the first in the world.
THE VIRUS IS "TOTALLY" INFRINGING THE CELL ENTRANCE KEY
The vaccines use the Spike (crown) protein on the Covid-19 virus as a key and bind to the ACE 2 protein in the human cell, opening the "cell lock" and infecting the cell and the body. Vaccines or antibodies produced by innate immunity target a single point on the Spike protein, making it almost as if the key and the lock do not match, so that the virus cannot enter the cell.
"IF EVERYTHING GOES WELL, IT’S READY TO BE SERVED AT THE END OF DECEMBER "
"We designed a medicine that is administered through the nose because the epitheliums are located here. This is where the virus first multiplies. There are various studies in the world that it would be more advantageous to develop a treatment, medicine candidate, or vaccine that will directly protect the tissue here. If everything goes well, our phase studies won’t take that as long as vaccine studies. "We don't expect it to take long. Because a response needs to be observed in vaccine studies, it already takes a few months for this response to occur. We hope that if everything goes well, we can start using it by the end of December."
