Bacterial weapons against viral diseases

Discovery of two novel classes of natural products with activity against RNA viruses.

The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically demonstrated that the development of effective agents against viral pathogens is of great importance for global health. Although effective vaccines are available for many viral diseases, there is an urgent need for new and effective therapeutic treatments. At the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS), the team led by Prof Rolf Müller is researching novel active substances for the treatment of infections. In their latest studies, the researchers were able to identify two new natural product families with promising activity against viruses. Their results have now been published in the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 has challenged healthcare systems around the world in an unprecedented way. The rapid global spread of this pathogen, combined with sometimes severe disease progression, shows how urgently effective drugs are needed to treat viral diseases. However, SARS-CoV-2 is by far not the only human pathogenic RNA virus with high economic and social relevance. Therefore, especially in view of possible viral pandemics of the future, the identification of new agents with broad efficacy against emerging viral pathogens is of utmost importance. Rolf Müller’s team at HIPS has been successfully researching antibacterial natural products isolated from soil bacteria for many years. In particular, actinobacteria, which have already been studied for decades, and myxobacteria, which have only been researched to a much lesser extent, are valuable sources for new natural products. HIPS is a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in cooperation with Saarland University.

The researchers have now succeeded in isolating two new families of active substances with antiviral activity from the adept natural product producers: the persicamidines and the thiamyxines. While the persicamidines were isolated from a newly discovered strain of actinobacteria, the thiamyxins originate from a strain of myxobacteria found by HIPS scientists in the immediate vicinity of the institute. Within the scope of the citizen science project “The Microbial Treasure Chest”, the strain collection of HIPS could already be extended by about 1000 new myxobacteria, which were isolated from more than 700 soil samples sent in so far (more information at: https://www.hips.saarland/sample/).

Both of the abovementioned bacterial families are known natural product producers, especially for antibiotics. In the studies now published, the scientists at HIPS, in collaboration with the virus specialists in the research groups of Prof Thomas Pietschmann at TWINCORE and Prof Ralf Bartenschlager at DKFZ, are using their profound experience and expertise in the field of antibiotics research to isolate the new natural products and investigate them in greater detail with regard to their antiviral activity.

Both natural product families show structural peculiarities, which in the case of the persicamidines required extensive structural analyses. For the thiamyxins, it was even possible to describe a biosynthetic model by means of so-called feeding experiments with specially labeled precursors. For both newly discovered natural product families, the scientists were able to demonstrate strong inhibition of RNA viruses in Corona-, Zika- and dengue virus infection models. In the case of persicamidines, activities against SARS-CoV-2 and hCoV-229E are even roughly comparable to the conditionally approved drug remdesivir, which is used to treat COVID-19.

“The problem of antimicrobial resistance and the search for new antibiotics are the core of our research. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a powerful reminder of how important the development of antiviral agents is as well. Therefore, in the future, we intend to use our expertise to develop compounds against both bacterial and viral infections. In the case of persicamidines, we see that the starting point for solving global problems may even be right on our doorstep,” says Rolf Müller, Managing Director of HIPS, Head of the Department Microbial Natural Products and Coordinator of the Research Area Novel Antibiotics at the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF).

Due to their good antiviral activities, the new natural product classes represent promising starting points for the development of future active agents against SARS-CoV-2 and other RNA viruses. Biotechnological optimization of the production or the development of a chemical synthesis route are now of great interest due to the comparatively low production rates of the thiamyxins in order to make the natural product available in sufficient quantities for further analyses. In follow-up studies, the researchers intend to investigate the mode-of-action of the two new natural product families, the elucidation of which will be a further step towards the development of antiviral agents.

This press release is also available on our website: https://www.helmholtz-hzi.de/en/news-events/news/view/article/complete/bakteriel….

Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland:
HIPS in Saarbrücken was founded jointly by the HZI and Saarland University in 2009. Researchers here are looking in particular for new active ingredients against infectious diseases, optimizing them for use in humans and investigating how these can best be transported to their site of action in the human body. http://www.helmholtz-hips.de/

Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research:
Scientists at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig and other locations in Germany study bacterial and viral infections and the body’s defense mechanisms. They have in-depth expertise in natural products research and their use as a valuable source of novel anti-infectives. As a member of the Helmholtz Association and the German Centre for Infection Research (DZIF), the HZI conducts translational research to lay the foundations for the development of novel therapies and vaccines against infectious diseases. http://www.helmholtz-hzi.de/en/

TWINCORE – Center for Experimental and Clinical Infection Research:
At TWINCORE, basic scientists from a wide range of disciplines work side-by-side with medical scientists in infectious disease research. Our focus is on translational research, i.e. the interface between basic research and clinical application. TWINCORE was founded in 2008 jointly by the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) and the Hannover Medical School (MHH). https://www.twincore.de/en/home/

German Cancer Research Center in the Helmholtz Association:
With more than 3,000 employees, the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) is the largest biomedical research institution in Germany. At DKFZ, more than 1,300 scientists investigate how cancer develops, record cancer risk factors and search for new strategies to prevent people from developing cancer. They develop new methods to diagnose tumors more precisely and treat cancer patients more successfully. At DKFZ’s Cancer Information Service (KID), affected persons, interested members of the public and experts receive individual answers to all questions on the subject of cancer. Together with partners from the university hospitals, DKFZ operates the National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT) at the Heidelberg and Dresden sites, and the Hopp Children’s Tumor Center KiTZ in Heidelberg. In the German Consortium for Translational Cancer Research (DKTK), one of the six German Centers for Health Research, the DKFZ maintains translational centers at seven university partner sites. The combination of excellent university medicine with the top-class research of a Helmholtz center at the NCT and the DKTK sites is an important contribution to transferring promising approaches from cancer research to the clinic and thus improving the chances of cancer patients. The DKFZ is funded 90 percent by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research and 10 percent by the state of Baden-Württemberg and is a member of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers. https://www.dkfz.de/en/index.html

German Center for Infection Research:
At the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF), more than 500 researchers from 35 institutions nationwide are jointly developing new approaches to the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of infectious diseases. The goal is so-called translation: the rapid, effective transfer of research results into clinical practice. In this way, the DZIF paves the way for the development of new vaccines, diagnostics and drugs against infections. Further information: http://www.dzif.de/en.

Contact:
Dr Yannic Nonnenmacher
PR Manager HIPS
+49 681 98806-4500
yannic.nonnenmacher@helmholtz-hips.de

Originalpublikation:

Haack, P.A., Harmrolfs, K., Bader, C.D., Garcia, R., Gunesch, A.P., Haid, S., Popoff, A., Voltz, A., Kim, H., Bartenschlager, R., Pietschmann, T., and Müller, R.* (2022) Thiamyxins: Structure and Biosynthesis of Myxobacterial RNA-Virus Inhibitors, Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., e202212946

Keller, L., Oueis, E., Kaur, A., Safaei, N., Kirsch, S.H., Gunesch, A.P., Haid, S., Rand, U., Čičin-Šain, L., Fu, C., Wink, J., Pietschmann, T., and Müller, R.* (2023) Persicamidines—Unprecedented Sesquarterpenoids with Potent Antiviral Bioactivity against Coronaviruses, Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., e202214595

https://www.helmholtz-hzi.de/en/news-events/news/view/article/complete/bakterielle-waffen-gegen-virale-erkrankungen/