Question

What are body’s physical and anatomical barriers to a coronavirus infection? How do they limit infection? What the role do antimicrobial proteins play in the initial chemical defense to coronavirus infection? Which pathway(s) of Complement are activated by coronaviruses? Which mechanism(s) are most adept at combating coronaviruses? Please explain

Answer 1

The body's physical and anatomical barriers to a coronavirus infection includes:

• Skin - The outer covering of a body whose functions include protection, regulation, and sensation.
• Mucous membranes - an epithelial tissue which secretes mucus and thus protects the internal passages in the body mainly due to this antiviral and antibacterial mucus.
• Endothelia - the tissue that forms a single layer of cells lining various organs and cavities of the body.
• Bony encasements - It protects vital organs from the viral infection.Examples inclure skull and thoracic cage.

Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are short, positively-charged oligopeptides that exhibit a diversity of structures and functions.They are part of the innate immune system of a person. Human antimicrobial proteins is a class of processed functional peptides. Major cationic antimicrobial proteins includes eosinophil-derived neurotoxin (EDN) and eosinophil cationic protein (ECP). Both these proteins contain characteristic RNase A superfamily structures and catalytic residues. They exhibit antimicrobial activity against both bacteria and viruses.

The role antimicrobial proteins play in the initial chemical defense to coronavirus infection include:

• It mostly shows an inhibitory activity.
• EDN ribonuclease activity directly targets extracellular viral particles.
• Soluble factors produced by hosts such as chemokines, interferons, RNases, and alloantigen-stimulated factors (ASF) have been reported to inhibit HIV-1 replication or binding.Thus we can suggest similar effects on the coronavirus.

The viruses are known to be recognized by the three pathways of the complement system. The first two pathways are activated with the help of pattern recognition molecules. The last pathway is activated spontaneously and without any help from the pattern recognition molecules. Thus Activation of the complement system occurs through multiple mechanisms that include three pathways, the classical, lectin, and alternative complement activation path-ways. The lecithin pathway of Complement is activated by coronaviruses.

Till date there are no medicines that have been shown to prevent or cure coronavirus.The antibacterial treatment only helps in reducing it's symptoms. The main mechanism used these days to combat coronavirus is to maintain our immunity at it's peak levels. Such that the body's immunity to viral infections itself will automatically cure the disease with given time. Antibodies are the key to fighting future coronavirus infections. Prevention is always better than cure thus the most effective way to prevent the spread of this is to practice social distancing and personal and environmental hygiene maintanence. Other steps include tracking of patients and affected places while analyzing the pattern of the outbreak. Also other ways that complement these steps are to quarantine the infected and take proper care of them following protocols.