Broad-spectrum Respiratory Virus Entry Inhibitors

Abstract

With the increasing global human population, travel and socioeconomic activities, more and more novel pathogenic viruses will emerge or re-emerge. While more than 260 viruses are known to infect humans, only a small minority of these viral diseases are treatable by clinically approved antiviral drugs. Apart from these identified viruses, new emerging viruses and drug-resistant viruses are also important challenges to our public health and healthcare systems. The COVID-19 and influenza pandemics remind us the importance of getting broad-spectrum antivirals against emerging and re-emerging respiratory viruses. Broad-spectrum antivirals against different viral families for fighting the currently known viruses and novel emerging viruses are urgently needed. Viral entry is the universal first step for viral infection, and therefore is a promising target for identifying broad-spectrum antivirals. In this chapter, we mainly focus on discussing the risks of respiratory viruses, the challenge of finding broad-spectrum antivirals, the entry processes of respiratory viruses, the current studies on broad-spectrum entry inhibitors for respiratory viruses, and the directions for discovering broad-spectrum antivirals in the future.