Spike Protein of SARS-CoV-2 Activates Macrophages and Contributes to Induction of Acute Lung Inflammations in Mice

Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients exhibit multiple organ malfunctions with a primary manifestation of acute and diffuse lung injuries. The Spike protein of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is crucial to mediate viral entry into host cells; however, whether it can be cellularly pathogenic and contribute to pulmonary hyper-inflammations in COVID-19 is not well known.

Methods and Findings: In this study, we developed a Spike protein-pseudotyped (Spp) lentivirus with the proper tropism of SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein on the surface and tracked down the fate of Spp in wild type C57BL/6J mice receiving intravenous injection of the virus. A lentivirus with vesicular stomatitis virus glycoprotein (VSV-G) was used as the control. Two hours post-infection (hpi), Spp showed more than 27-75 times more viral burden in the lungs than other organs; it also exhibited about 3-5 times more viral burden than VSV-G lentivirus in the lungs, liver, kidney and spleen. Acute pneumonia was evident in animals 24 hpi. Spp lentivirus was mainly found in LDLR+ macrophages and pneumocytes in the lungs, but not in MARC1+ macrophages. IL6, IL10, CD80 and PPAR-γ were quickly upregulated in response to infection of Spp lentivirus in the lungs in vivo as well as in macrophage-like RAW264.7 cells in vitro. We further confirmed that forced expression of the Spike protein in RAW264.7 cells could significantly increase the mRNA levels of the same panel of inflammatory factors.

Conclusions: Our results demonstrate that the Spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 alone can induce cellular pathology, e.g. activating macrophages and contributing to induction of acute inflammatory responses.

Errataetall:

UpdateIn: FASEB J. 2021 Sep;35(9):e21801. - PMID 34365657

Medienart:

E-Artikel

Erscheinungsjahr:

2020

Erschienen:

2020

Enthalten in:

Zur Gesamtaufnahme - year:2020

Enthalten in:

bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology - (2020) vom: 07. Dez.

Sprache:

Englisch

Beteiligte Personen:

Cao, Xiaoling [VerfasserIn]
Tian, Yan [VerfasserIn]
Nguyen, Vi [VerfasserIn]
Zhang, Yuping [VerfasserIn]
Gao, Chao [VerfasserIn]
Yin, Rong [VerfasserIn]
Carver, Wayne [VerfasserIn]
Fan, Daping [VerfasserIn]
Albrecht, Helmut [VerfasserIn]
Cui, Taixing [VerfasserIn]
Tan, Wenbin [VerfasserIn]

Links:

Volltext

Themen:

COVID-19
Inflammation
Lung
Preprint
SARS-CoV-2
Spike

Anmerkungen:

Date Revised 19.10.2023

published: Electronic

UpdateIn: FASEB J. 2021 Sep;35(9):e21801. - PMID 34365657

Citation Status PubMed-not-MEDLINE

doi:

10.1101/2020.12.07.414706

funding:

Förderinstitution / Projekttitel:

PPN (Katalog-ID):

NLM318959178