US experts found the key protein of Ebola infection

The discovery that Ebola virus must be combined with a protein to infect its host will help prevent the spread of Ebola virus and treat the Ebola haemorrhagic fever it causes, US researchers said in a report Thursday In the latest issue of the American Journal of Microbiology, the researchers pointed out that mouse experiments showed that the Ebola virus must pass a protein code named NPC1 to enter the body cells Once the Ebola virus is prevented from binding with the protein, it will lose the ability to infect the body "Our research shows that NPC1 protein is the Achilles heel of Ebola virus infection," said Kartik chandran, an associate professor at the University of Yeshiva, in a statement "Mice without two copies of NPC1 gene will therefore lack NPC1 protein, which can completely resist (Ebola virus) infection." The researchers infected three kinds of mice with Ebola virus: the first was wild-type normal mice, the second was mice with two copies of NPC1 gene completely missing, the third was mice with one copy of NPC1 gene normal and another copy variant Results all the normal mice were infected and died, but the mice with complete loss of NPC1 gene were completely unaffected and protected 100% The third kind of mice were infected at the beginning, but they finally eliminated the virus by their own immune system, which may indicate that the immune system can defeat the Ebola virus as long as the virus is controlled in a certain number The role of NPC1 protein is to participate in cholesterol transport in cells People who lack this protein due to gene mutation will suffer from a fatal neurodegenerative disease called Niemann peak disease However, the new research suggests that the treatment targeting NPC1 protein is still feasible "We think it's only a short time before patients are able to tolerate treatments that inhibit this protein," said Andrew Herbert, a senior scientist at the U.S Army Institute of infectious disease medicine who participated in the study At present, no Ebola drug has been approved for marketing All the drugs under development are focused on attacking virus, and the above-mentioned therapy targeting NPC1 protein is the first Ebola therapy aiming at the host's autoimmune ability.