Body of Abstract: The contribution of plant biotechnology in combating the COVID-19 pandemic
Qiang Chen
The Biodesign Institute and School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, USA
The current COVID-19 pandemic is caused by infection of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Vaccine development against SARS-CoV-2 proceeded at an unprecedented pace and has resulted in multiple effective products. However, immunocompromised and elderly individuals will benefit from the development of therapeutic monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), given that these populations do not develop a robust and durable response from vaccination or prior infection. While several mAbs have been approved for clinical use via Emergency Use Authorization (EUA), all these mAbs are subject to mutation escape by new viral variants, rendering them useless against new variants of concern. In the current study, we describe the development of a novel class of mAbs against SARS-CoV-2 in Nicotiana benthamiana plants. We demonstrate that this new class of mAb neutralizes all variants of concern, including multiple Omicron variants. Mechanistic studies show that these mAbs bind to a unique site on the spike protein of the virus that is not under selective pressure to mutate. Furthermore, due to the unique post-translational modifications of plants, our new mAbs displays neutralizing synergy with other classes of mAbs in killing SARS-CoV-2 and greatly enhances the therapeutic efficacy of EUA mAbs against all variants of concern. This study highlights the utility of plant-based systems in developing novel therapeutics against the ever-evolving SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and other emerging viral outbreaks.