LSU Health Sciences professor William Gallaher discovered a protein model that will help lay the groundwork for an effective antiviral drug to combat Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome.
Gallaher, professor of microbiology, immunology, and parasitology at LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans, along with Robert Garry, professor of microbiology and immunology at Tulane University Health Sciences Center, developed a model of a critical surface protein of the virus that causes SARS.
SARS, a respiratory illness caused from the coronavirus, has killed 464 people worldwide and infected 6,300.
The respiratory illness has hit mainland China the hardest with 206 reported deaths.
Gallaher is also known for discovering how the Ebola and Human Immunodeficiency Viruses (HIV) invade cells.
Gallaher said previous studies with HIV cells helped in the discovery of the protein.
“Our studies over the past 20 years have put us in the position to design predicted inhibitors of the SARS coronavirus in a short time frame,” Garry said in an official statement from the LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans.
Gallaher hopes an antiviral drug will be developed to control the worldwide SARS outbreak and prevent it from spreading further.
Two antiviral drugs are being designed to combat SARS, he said.
Gallaher said both have important antiviral activity, but one has the capability of being given orally.
The SARS antiviral will not be available for another five to 10 years because of stringent FDA tests designed to create safe drugs, Gallaher said.
SARS has not affected the United States, and Gallaher said no one can determine if it will.
“No one can accurately predict what will happen,” Gallaher said. “It could be controlled or it could become a large outbreak”
The two scientists have filed for patent rights and also have arranged for the model to be posted on the Web to let scientists around the world working on SARS have immediate and full access to the new research.