NHRI’s Antibody Therapy for the Novel COVID-19 Virus Reveals Promise in Animal Tests

The advancement in informatics and diagnostic technologies have added to the growth of the biotech and gene editing vertical. With the most recent advancements in metabolomics analytical technologies and fields comprising monoclonal antibodies reveal the precise value of metabolomics tools in gene-function analysis, diagnostic platforms, biomarker discovery, and systems biology. Since metabolites characterize the downstream appearance of proteome, genome, and transcriptome, these can thoroughly imitate the phenotype of an organism at an explicit period.

However, talking specifically about monoclonal antibodies, one of such kind of treatment as monoclonal antibody (mAb) treatment is being developed by the Taiwan’s National Health Research Institutes (NHRI). Monoclonal antibody has already proved to substantially curb down levels of the COVID-19 virus in infected animals, as what told by the NHRI’s leading infectious disease official on Wednesday, that is 29th July 2020. In recent testing on hamsters infected with COVID-19, those given two types of lab-made antibodies, known as mAb-X and mAb-Y, showed levels of the virus in their lungs up to 100 times lower than those in the control group, said Liao Ching-len, director of the NHRI’s Institute of Infectious Diseases and Vaccinology.

Currently, existing biotechnology technologies such as monoclonal antibodies (Mabs), Cell therapies and many more are utilized to identify different viruses to develop antibodies against COVID-19. As far as NHRI’s study is concerned, the Hamsters which got the treatment additionally maintained their original body weight and activity levels, while those that did not lost weight and became less active, Liao said at the Central Epidemic Command Center’s (CECC) weekly press briefing.

Though there had already been similar research projects carried out by a few organizations, such as in April 22, 2020, Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC), based in India, funded 16 companies for the development of COVID-19 therapeutics, vaccines, and devices. Similarly, in the month of March, Regeneron discovered hundreds of antibodies potent to neutralize virus so as to further create an antibody cocktail therapy. Numerous companies including Regeneron Pharmaceuticals and Incyt, CytoDyn among others are competing to develop new innovative technologies such as monoclonal technologies targeting SARS-CoV-2 virus.