Figure 3.

Entry driven by the S protein of SARS-CoV-2 variant B.1.617 can be blocked with soluble ACE2 and camostat mesylate

(A) S protein-bearing particles were incubated with different concentrations of soluble ACE2 (sol-ACE2) for 30 min at 37°C before the mixtures were inoculated onto Caco-2 cells.

(B) Caco-2 target cells were preincubated with different concentrations of the serine protease inhibitor camostat mesylate for 1 h at 37°C before S protein-bearing particles were added.

Transduction efficiency was quantified by measuring virus-encoded luciferase activity in cell lysates 16–18 h after transduction. For normalization, SARS-CoV-2 S protein-driven entry in the absence of sol-ACE2 or camostat was set as 0% inhibition. Presented are the average (mean) data from three biological replicates (each performed with technical quadruplicates. Error bars indicate the SEM. Statistical significance of differences between the WT and the variant S proteins or VSV-G was analyzed by two-way ANOVA with Dunnett’s posttest (p > 0.05, ns [not significant, not indicated in the graphs]; ^∗∗∗p ≤ 0.001).