Encapsulating Cas9 into extracellular vesicles by protein myristoylation.

CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing is a very promising avenue for the treatment of a variety of genetic diseases. However, it is still very challenging to encapsulate CRISPR/Cas9 machinery for delivery. Protein N-myristoylation is an irreversible co/post-translational modification that results in the covalent attachment of the myristoyl-group to the N-terminus of a target protein.

Polyphenols as Potential Inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 RNA Dependent RNA Polymerase (RdRp).

An increasing number of studies have demonstrated the antiviral nature of polyphenols, and many polyphenols have been proposed to inhibit SARS-CoV or SARS-CoV-2. Our previous study revealed the inhibitory mechanisms of polyphenols against DNA polymerase α and HIV reverse transcriptase to show that polyphenols can block DNA elongation by competing with the incoming NTPs. Here we applied computational approaches to examine if some polyphenols can also inhibit RNA polymerase (RdRp) in SARS-CoV-2, and we identified some better candidates than remdesivir, the FDA-approved drug against RdRp, in terms of estimated binding affinities.

Polyphenols as alternative treatments of COVID-19.

Although scientists around the world have put lots of effort into the development of new treatments for COVID-19 since the outbreak, no drugs except Veklury (remdesivir) have been approved by FDA. There is an urgent need to discover some alternative antiviral treatment for COVID-19. Because polyphenols have been shown to possess antiviral activities, here we conducted a large-scale virtual screening for more than 400 polyphenols.