Search

Small molecule inhibitors have previously been investigated in different studies as possible therapeutics in the treatment of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). In the current drug repurposing study, we identified the leukotriene (D4) receptor antagonist montelukast as a novel agent that simultaneously targets two important drug targets of SARS-CoV-2. We initially demonstrated the dual inhibition profile of montelukast through multiscale molecular modeling studies. Next, we characterized its effect on both targets by different in vitro experiments including the enzyme (main protease) inhibition-based assay, surface plasmon resonance (SPR) spectroscopy, pseudovirus neutralization on HEK293T/hACE2+TMPRSS2, and virus neutralization assay using xCELLigence MP real-time cell analyzer. Our integrated in silico and in vitro results confirmed the dual potential effect of montelukast both on the main protease enzyme inhibition and virus entry into the host cell (spike/ACE2). The virus neutralization assay results showed that SARS-CoV-2 virus activity was delayed with montelukast for 20 h on the infected cells. The rapid use of new small molecules in the pandemic is very important today. Montelukast, whose pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic properties are very well characterized and has been widely used in the treatment of asthma since 1998, should urgently be completed in clinical phase studies and, if its effect is proved in clinical phase studies, it should be used against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)., Competing Interests: Declaration of interests The authors declare no competing interests., (Copyright © 2021 The American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Earlier studies have shown a strong correlation between the enthalpy of formation, ΔHf,ox , and the ionic conductivity, σi , near room temperature in doped ceria systems, which are promising solid electrolytes for intermediate-temperature solid oxide fuel cells (IT-SOFCs). The present work demonstrates that this correlation holds at the operating temperature of IT-SOFCs, 600-700 °C. Solid solutions of Ce1-x Ndx O2-0.5x , Ce1-x Smx O2-0.5x , and Ce1-x Sm0.5x Nd0.5x O2-0.5x are studied. The ΔHf,ox at 702 °C is determined by considering the excess heat content between 25 and 702 °C combined with the value of ΔHf,ox at 25 °C. Both σi and ΔHf,ox show maxima at x=0.15 and 0.20 for the singly and doubly doped ceria, respectively, suggesting that the number of mobile oxygen vacancies in these solid solutions reaches a maximum near those compositions. An increase in temperature results in a shift of the maximum in both ΔHf,ox and σi towards higher concentrations. This shift results from a gradual increase in dissociation of the defect associates., (© 2014 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.)