Year: 2020
Type: preprint
Abstract: COVID-19 presents herculean challenges to research and scientific communities for producing diagnostic and treatment solutions. Any return to normalcy requires rapid development of countermeasures, with animal models serving as a critical tool in testing vaccines and therapeutics. Animal disease status and potential COVID-19 exposure prior to study execution may severely bias efficacy testing. We developed a toolbox of immunological and molecular tests to monitor countermeasure impact on disease outcome and evaluate pre-challenge COVID-19 status. Assay application showed critical necessity for animal pre-screening. Specifically, real-time PCR results documented pre-exposure of an African Green Monkey prior to SARS-CoV-2 challenge with sequence confirmation as a community-acquired exposure. Longitudinal monitoring of nasopharyngeal swabs and serum showed pre-exposure impacted both viral disease course and resulting immunological response. This study demonstrates utility in a comprehensive pre-screening strategy for animal models, which captured the first documented case of community-acquired, non-human primate infection. One Sentence Summary Pre-exposure to SARS-CoV-2 affects biomarker responses in animal models, highlighting a need for robust pre-screening protocols prior to medical countermeasure studies.
Authors: Keersten M. Ricks, Andrew S. Herbert, Jeffrey W. Koehler, Paul A. Kuehnert, Tamara L. Clements, Charles J. Shoemaker, Ana I. Kuehne, Cecilia M. O’Brien, Susan R. Coyne, Korey L. Delp, Kristen S. Akers, John M. Dye, Jay W. Hooper, Jeffrey M. Smith, Jeffrey R. Kugelman, Brett F. Beitzel, Kathleen M. Gibson, Sara C. Johnston, Timothy D. Minogue
Language: English
Subfield: Infectious Diseases
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
Funder: Defense Health Agency
OpenAlex ID: W3039804493