Cure for common cold discovered?

ShaneU

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/a-cure-for-the-common-cold-may-finally-be-achieved-as-a-result-of-a-remarkable-discovery-in-a-cambridge-laboratory-2122607.html

In a dramatic breakthrough that could affect millions of lives, scientists have been able to show for the first time that the body's immune defences can destroy the common cold virus after it has actually invaded the inner sanctum of a human cell, a feat that was believed until now to be impossible.

The discovery opens the door to the development of a new class of antiviral drugs that work by enhancing this natural virus-killing machinery of the cell. Scientists believe the first clinical trials of new drugs based on the findings could begin within two to five years.

The researchers said that many other viruses responsible for a range of diseases could also be targeted by the new approach. They include the norovirus, which causes winter vomiting, and rotavirus, which results in severe diarrhoea and kills thousands of children in developing countries.

Viruses are still mankind's biggest killers, responsible for twice as many deaths as cancer, essentially because they can get inside cells where they can hide away from the body's immune defences and the powerful antibiotic drugs that have proved invaluable against bacterial infections.

However, a study by a team of researchers from the world-famous Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge has shown that this textbook explanation of the limits of the human immune system is wrong because anti-viral antibodies can in fact enter the cell with the invading virus where they are able to trigger the rapid destruction of the foreign invader.

"In any immunology textbook you will read that once a virus makes it into a cell, that is game over because the cell is now infected. At that point there is nothing the immune response can do other than kill that cell," said Leo James, who led the research team.

But studies at the Medical Research Council's laboratory have found that the antibodies produced by the immune system, which recognise and attack invading viruses, actually ride piggyback into the inside of a cell with the invading virus.

Once inside the cell, the presence of the antibody is recognised by a naturally occurring protein in the cell called TRIM21 which in turn activates a powerful virus-crushing machinery that can eliminate the virus within two hours – long before it has the chance to hijack the cell to start making its own viral proteins. "This is the last opportunity a cell gets because after that it gets infected and there is nothing else the body can do but kill the cell," Dr James said.

"The antibody is attached to the virus and when the virus gets sucked inside the cell, the antibody stays attached, there is nothing in that process to make the antibody to fall off.

"The great thing about it is that there shouldn't be anything attached to antibodies in the cell, so that anything that is attached to the antibody is recognised as foreign and destroyed."

In the past, it was thought that the antibodies of the immune system worked entirely outside the cells, in the blood and other extra-cellular fluids of the body. Now scientists realise that there is another layer of defence inside the cells where it might be possible to enhance the natural anti-virus machinery of the body.

"The beauty of it is that for every infection event, for every time a virus enters a cell, it is also an opportunity for the antibody in the cells to take the virus out," Dr James said.

"That is the key concept that is different from how we think about immunity. At the moment we think of professional immune cells such as T-cells [white blood cells] that patrol the body and if they find anything they kill it.

"This system is more like an ambush because the virus has to go into the cell at some point and every time they do this, this immune mechanism has a chance of taking it out," he explained.

"It's certainly a very fast process. We've shown that once it enters the cell it gets degraded within an hour or two hours, that's very fast," he added.

The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, involved human cells cultured in the laboratory and will need to be replicated by further research on animals before the first clinical trials with humans.

One possibility is that the protein TRIM21 could be used in a nasal spray to combat the many types of viruses that cause the common cold. "The kind of viruses that are susceptible to this are the rhinoviruses, which cause the common cold, noravirus, which causes winter vomiting, rotavirus, which cause gastroenteritis. In this country these are the kind of viruses that people are most likely to be exposed to," Dr James said.

"This is a way of boosting all the antibodies you'd be naturally making against the virus. The advantage is that you can use that one drug against potentially lots of viral infections."

"We can think of administering these drugs as nasal sprays and inhalers rather than taking pills... It could lead to an effective treatment for the common cold," he said. "The beauty of this system is that you give the virus no chance to make its own proteins to fight back. It is a way for the cell to get rid of the virus and stay alive itself."

Sir Greg Winter, deputy director of the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, said: "Antibodies are formidable molecular war machines; it now appears that they can continue to attack viruses within cells. This research is not only a leap in our understanding of how and where antibodies work, but more generally in our understanding of immunity and infection."

How the virus is tackled

* 1 Virus (purple) circulating in the bloodstream recognised by antibodies (yellow) of the immune system

* 2 Virus attaches to outer cell membrane with antibodies still attached

* 3 Virus invades the cell membrane and emerges inside the cell

* 4 Remains of cell membrane disappear and the virus is free to hijack the cell

* 5 TRIM21 protein (blue) recognises attached antibodies as foreign material

* 6 Powerful virus-destroying machines (cylinders) attracted to virus by TRIM21

* 7 Virus rapidly broken down and disabled within hours

Could save so many lives, especially the elderly.

Celly Smunt

sniff.

KeithM89_old

So i can run around naked in the snow without consequence??

cian1500ww

KeithM89 wrote: »

So i can run around naked in the snow without consequence??

Only if you have a cure for a chilly willy

bleg

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2010/sep/24/1

Degag

There seems to be one of these "cure for......." articles buzzing around every 6 months. I'll believe it when i see it.

Mmcd

KeithM89 wrote: »

So i can run around naked in the snow without consequence??

Being cold doesn't give you a cold!

Nulty

2 days too late...I'm just starting to recover

Adam

how long before our immune systems just stop developing?

alwaysadub

Nulty wrote: »

2 days too late...I'm just starting to recover

Same as. Poxy things they are.

flyton5

ShaneU wrote: »

Could save so many lives, especially the elderly.

Oh great...elderly people living longer and costing more money. I'm in favour of giving them the cold. Not making them better.

Nulty

I say starting to recover, but thats just my eternal optimism. I'm still very sick/

DOC09UNAM

Degag wrote: »

There seems to be one of these "cure for......." articles buzzing around every 6 months. I'll believe it when i see it.

But... didn't you read step number 7.

Lando Griffin

Ah crap, there goes my guaranteed and additional 2 weeks off in the year.

bleg

Degag wrote: »

There seems to be one of these "cure for......." articles buzzing around every 6 months. I'll believe it when i see it.

Well from what I can see they've identified a protein that may aid in suppressing the common cold. By the time you've validated those claims, formulated the product (very difficult to get a protein nasal spray drug delivery system), completed preclinical and clinical trials you're looking at 10+ years. Easy article for the independent to write though, just followed the generic scientific discovery article framework and added in a **** load of quotations.

iPlop

This will be shelved and the people that discovered it will be paid off.Thats what I would do if I was a CEO of a major pharmaceutical company making billions from the common cold every year;)

scientific1982

Adam wrote: »

how long before our immune systems just stop developing?

Never.

gurramok

About bloody time. It took the scientific community decades of expensive funding to find a cure. I wonder will the drug companies try to stop it as it will affect their profits?

Bonito

scientific1982 wrote: »

Never.

You'd know.

Adam

scientific1982 wrote: »

Never.

here, i got you a sarcasm detector. use it wisely.

Princess Peach

This is awful news!

I like my sexy cold voice. Sticky shoes

OutlawPete

You mean 'Science' was wrong?? :eek:

msg11

Nothing beats a good owl **** when ya have a cold/flu...

hal9000

Princess Peach wrote: »

This is awful news!

I like my sexy cold voice. Sticky shoes

Theres always smoking?

Princess Peach

hal9000 wrote: »

Theres always smoking?

Oh yeah, sexy as Deirdre from Corrie

Gunsfortoys

I knew God would prove science wrong.

hal9000

Princess Peach wrote: »

Oh yeah, sexy as Deirdre from Corrie

eeeewwww, stick with the H1N1

Professey Chin

Princess Peach wrote: »

Oh yeah, sexy as Deirdre from Corrie

Or Patty & Selma

Rarrrr

scientific1982

Bonito wrote: »

You'd know.

I knew you were going to say that.

marcsignal

stay fit, and avoid a cold in the first place

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11664660

.

Princess Peach

Ultimate Chin wrote: »

Or Patty & Selma

Rarrrr

To the shop!

Bonito

scientific1982 wrote: »

I knew you were going to say that.

You knew that I, and only I, was going to say that?

scientific1982

Bonito wrote: »

You knew that I, and only I, was going to say that?

You think thats air you're breathing. Interesting.

Canis Lupus

[Conspiracy]

Drugs companies will never allow a cure. Why make one cure when you can sell countless palliatives instead.

[/conspiracy]

Professey Chin

scientific1982 wrote: »

You think thats air you're breathing. Interesting.

There is no spoon.Only forks.
And the only thing on the menu is chicken soup.........what a cruel cruel world

phill106

msg11 wrote: »

Nothing beats a good owl **** when ya have a cold/flu...

Leave that owl alone!

Princess Peach

Ultimate Chin wrote: »

There is no spoon.Only forks.
And the only thing on the menu is chicken soup.........what a cruel cruel world

Stick your face in the bowl and suck it out!

ScumLord

Maybe I've never really had the cold or flu but any time I've had symptoms I've never found it all that bad, one or two days of sniffles, sore throat gone in a day or two.

I don't see the point in a healthy adult taking any medication to fight it off, just take a load of vitamin C and you'll be grand in no time. There's no point forcing the bug to become something much stronger.

bleg

ScumLord wrote: »

Maybe I've never really had the cold or flu but any time I've had symptoms I've never found it all that bad, one or two days of sniffles, sore throat gone in a day or two.

I don't see the point in a healthy adult taking any medication to fight it off, just take a load of vitamin C and you'll be grand in no time. There's no point forcing the bug to become something much stronger.

Actually, don't waste your money on Vitamin C, it has no effect.