Figure 7.

SB 204990 suppressed WT and Omicron BA.1 SARS-CoV-2 replications in a golden Syrian hamster model. Hamsters were intranasally inoculated with 3×10³ PFU per hamster of SARS-CoV-2 WT or Omicron BA.1. At 6 hours post-infection each hamster was treated intraperitoneally with 10mg/kg of SB 204990 or 5% DMSO at a final volume of 1000 µL PBS. The infected hamsters were subsequently treated with SB 204990 or DMSO at 1, 2, and 3 days post infection for a total of 2 or 4 doses. The infected hamsters were sacrificed on day 2 (Omicron-infected hamsters) or day 4 post-infection (SARS-CoV-2 WT-infected) for virological and histological assessments. (A) Schematic illustration of the in vivo study. (B) Viral RdRp gene copies in hamster lung tissues that were infected by SARS-CoV-2 WT were quantified by qRT-PCR. (C) Viral RdRp gene copies in hamster lung tissues that were infected by Omicron BA.1 were quantified by qRT-PCR. (D) Infectious titer of SARS-CoV-2 WT in hamster lung tissues were quantified by plaque assays. (E) Viral antigen in hamster lung tissues from SARS-CoV-2 WT-infected hamsters were detected with an in-house anti-SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein antibody. Cell nuclei were identified with DAPI stain. Data represented mean and standard deviation from two independent experiments. Statistical differences were considered significant when P < 0.05. *P < 0.05 and ***P < 0.001. Scale bar in (E) represented 100µm.