PARIS, Mar. 4 (Benin News) –
A new study analyzed more than 3,000 proteins to identify those that are causally linked to the development of severe COVID-19. This is the first study to assess such a large number of proteins to determine their relationship to COVID-19. These results, published in the journal PLOS Genetics, provide insight into potential new targets for the treatment and prevention of severe cases of COVID-19.
The study, part-funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Maudsley Biomedical Research Center in the UK, used a genetic tool to analyze more than 3,000 proteins. The researchers identified six that may underlie an increased risk of severe COVID-19 and eight that, conversely, may contribute to protection against severe COVID-19.
One of the proteins (ABO) that has been identified as having a causal link with the risk of developing a severe form of COVID-19 determines blood groups, suggesting that blood groups play a decisive role in whether whether or not people develop severe forms of the disease.
Dr Alish Palmos, of the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neurosciences (IoPPN) at King’s College London and one of the study’s authors, explains that they used “a purely genetic approach to study a large number of blood proteins and we have established that a handful of them have causal links with the development of severe COVID-19. Focusing on this group of proteins is an essential first step in the discovery of potentially valuable targets for the development of new treatments.
Assessing the relationship between blood proteins and disease can help understand the underlying mechanisms and identify potential new targets for drug development or rehabilitation. Protein levels can be measured directly from blood samples, but conducting this type of research for large numbers of proteins is expensive and fails to establish a causal direction.
This is where genetics can play a role. Mendelian randomization, a method for comparing causal relationships between risk factors and health outcomes using large genetic data sets, can assess the relationship between exposure-related genetic variants (in this case , elevated levels of individual blood proteins) and genetic variants linked to disease outcome (in this case, severe COVID-19).
Dr. Vincent Millischer, co-author of the study and professor at the Medical University of Vienna (Austria), explains that “causality between exposure and disease can be a determining factor in the development of the disease.
“Causality between exposure and disease can be established because genetic variants inherited from parents to offspring are randomly assigned at conception, similar to how a randomized controlled trial assigns people to groups “, he explains. In our study, groups are defined by their genetic propensity for different blood protein levels, allowing us to assess the causal direction between elevated blood protein levels and COVID-19 severity, while avoiding the influence of environmental effects.
The study considered two incremental levels of COVID-19 severity: hospitalization and respiratory support or death. Using data from multiple genome-wide association studies, the researchers found six proteins causally linked to an increased risk of hospitalization or respiratory care or death from COVID-19 and eight causally linked. causal to protection against hospitalization or respiratory care or death.
The analysis showed some distinction between the types of proteins linked to hospitalization and those linked to respiratory support/death, indicating that different mechanisms may be at work in these two stages of the disease. .
The study found that an enzyme (ABO) that determines blood type was causally associated with an increased risk of hospitalization and the need for respiratory support. These results support previous findings about the association between blood type and an increased likelihood of death.
Combined with previous research showing that the proportion of type A is higher in people who are COVID-19 positive, this suggests that blood type A is a candidate for follow-up studies.
Co-author Dr Christopher Hübel, of IoPPN, King’s College London, adds that “the enzyme helps determine an individual’s blood type and our study has linked this enzyme to the risk of hospitalization, the need for respiratory assistance or death. »
“Our study does not establish a link between the precise blood group and the risk of serious COVID-19 – he notes – but given that previous research has shown that the proportion of people in group A is higher in people positive for COVID-19, this suggests that blood type A is the most likely candidate for follow-up studies. »
The researchers also identified three adhesion molecules that are associated with a lower risk of hospitalization and the need for respiratory support. As these adhesion molecules mediate the interaction between immune cells and blood vessels, this is consistent with previous research suggesting that late-stage COVID-19 is also a disease that affects the blood vessel wall.
By identifying this set of proteins, the research has highlighted a number of potential targets for drugs that could be used to help treat severe cases of COVID-19. These drugs will require further clinical research, which may be conducted as part of the larger COVID-Clinical Neuroscience Study (COVID-CNS), which investigates the underlying causes of different aspects of COVID-19.
Gerome Breen, professor of genetics at IoPPN and co-author of the article, points out that with this study, they have provided “a short list for the next stage of research”. Out of thousands of blood proteins, we have narrowed the list down to approximately 14 that have some causal link to severe COVID-19 risk, and which provide a potentially important avenue for further research to better understand the mechanisms underlying underlying COVID-19, with the ultimate goal of developing new treatments, but also preventive therapies”.