Could knowledge about how spiders make silk help #COVID19 patients? As a trained scientist, I'm using my time to answer questions put to me, and to uncover new facts and connections that others may not see. Here's thread #2...
#coronavirus destroys surfactant (soap)-making cells in the lungs, causing air passages to stick together & crackle while breathing. This 'crepitance' is seen in pneumonia and late stages of #covid19. Treating adults requires large amounts of surfactant but would it even work?...
Premature infants often suffer from respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) due to insufficient surfactant. This is treated today with surfactant preparations extracted from animal lungs, e.g. Curosurf, Infasurf, Alveofact, Survanta...
Clinical trials of surfactant therapy in adults with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) generally have shown improvements in oxygenation, but the results have been contradictory & failed to produce any demonstrable survival benefits. Why not?... 
The lack of success with surfactants in adults could be due to heterogeneity of patients, low doses, or inactivation of the surfactant in the lungs. But, there's new hope. In 2019, synthetic preparations of easy to make, more stable surfactants were published...
Surfactant proteins (SP-B, SP-C, fhSP-D) can be made in bacteria based on spider silk technology. The SP-C protein, for example, improves lung function in rabbits with acute respiratory failure and, unlike animal extracts, it can be made in large amounts...
Could this novel lung therapy help patients with #COVIDー19, pneumonia, or the next virus that emerges? I wonder. This is not medical advice but worth a discussion for sure...Please be safe!
Rabbit lung study: tinyurl.com/qracncg
Spider silk tech: tinyurl.com/yx78y7gm
Rabbit lung study: tinyurl.com/qracncg
Spider silk tech: tinyurl.com/yx78y7gm
