New round of funding includes five i3S projects

Five more projects led by i3S researchers were recently included in the second edition of the “RESEARCH 4 COVID-19” initiative, the line of financing created by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT - Foundation for Science and Technology) to support R&D projects capable of improving the response of national health systems to the impact of COVID-19. The i3S was thus able to guarantee the largest slice of financing - around 186 thousand euros - nationwide.

The solutions proposed by i3S include everything from the identification of genetic markers that predispose humans to susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection, to the possibility of early identification of patients at greatest risk, based on their iron profile. There are also projects to assess the impact of the new coronavirus on cancer patients and to try to understand if it is associated with dysfunction in the thyroid gland (hypothyroidism). I3S will also join the Instituto de Saúde Publica da Universidade do Porto (ISPUP - Institute of Public Health of the University of Porto) to develop a new serological study to detect specific antibodies to SARS-CoV-2.

In this second edition, researcher Luísa Pereira was financed with 40 thousand euros to develop a “genomic association study to assess human susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection, with a view to implementing a polygenic risk score”. In this project, which has ARS Norte as a partner “we will identify genetic markers that predispose humans to being susceptible or resistant to infection by SARS-CoV-2. To this end, we will characterize an array containing one million genetic markers in a thousand individuals in northern Portugal with positive molecular confirmation of infection, versus a thousand people in northern Portugal with negative molecular confirmation of infection (but who were at risk of direct contagion)” explains the researcher.

The identification of genetic markers (in the order of tens), underlines Luísa Pereira, “will allow the establishment of a polygenic risk prediction tool for Covid-19, to be used in the future to identify individuals with high or low risk of infection”.

Financed at 37,500 euros, and to be developed in partnership with the Banco de Sangue do Centro Hospitalar Vila Nova de Gaia|Espinho (CHVNG/E - Blood bank at the Central Hospital of Vila Nova de Gaia|Espinho), the Centro Hospitalar da Universidade de Coimbra (CHUC - University of Coimbra Central Hospital) and the Instituto de Saúde Publica da Universidade do Porto (ISPUP - Institute of Public Health of the University of Porto), the project led by researcher Anabela Cordeiro da Silva is called “Combination of serological profile and cytokines for assessing exposure to SARS-CoV-2”.

Serological studies to detect specific antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 are essential tools to estimate the actual number of infections and the possibility of immunity, therefore, explains the leader of the group “Parasite Disease”, “we propose to conduct a study of seroprevalence in the blood bank with detection of anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies by ELISA using a protocol published by the United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention”. In addition, adds Anabela Cordeiro da Silva, “the profile of cytokines produced by peripheral blood cells when restimulated with various peptides of the SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein will be performed in patients with doubtful serology as a complementary approach to viral exposure. The profile obtained will be compared with that of patients who have been infected and recovered (both symptomatic and asymptomatic)”.

Researcher Fernando Schmitt, for his part, is going to study the “Impact of Covid-19 in the treatment of cancer patients”, having been financed by FCT with 38,600 euros. “We know that SARS-CoV 2 infects human cells through the ACE receptor, present in the cell membrane, and that the interaction between the virus and this receptor is a potential factor in its infectious capacity. We also know that this ACE receptor is overexpressed in different types of cancer, so our goal is to assess the possibility of the virus directly infecting neoplastic cells using this same receptor and changing the biology of the neoplastic cell”, he explains.

“As already demonstrated for other viruses, the presence of Covid-19 can modify relevant characteristics of tumor cells with a possible impact on therapeutic options”, underlines Fernando Schmitt. For this study of the expression of the virus, its receptor and the proteins that can contribute to this interaction, several cases of neoplasms that were operated on patients infected by Covid-19 will be analyzed. The i3S researcher will work in collaboration with the Centro Hospitalar Universitário de São João (Porto), the University of São Paulo (Brazil) and the University of Trakya (Turkey).

“Ironing COVID-19 - Predicting disease severity from an individual’s iron profile” is the name of the project led by Maria Salomé Gomes, in collaboration with ICBAS and Centro Hospitalar Universitário São João. “The severity of COVID-19 is highly variable and clearly related to the affected individual’s previous health status. In addition, iron metabolism is critical for the progression of infectious diseases in general, so it must be admitted that it also plays an important role in the progression of SARS-CoV-2 infection”.

In this project, which was financed with 30 thousand euros, the team will “analyze blood samples taken from COVID-19 patients at the time of diagnosis, check markers related to iron metabolism, and then monitor the progression of the disease and its relationship with iron”. The objective of the project, says Maria Salomé Gomes, “will be to identify markers that can later be used in other patients as predictors of the severity of the disease. This way, the project will contribute to an early identification of patients at greatest risk and to a better management of the resources available for their effective treatment”. In addition, the project “will provide fundamental information to better understand the role of iron in the interaction between SARS-CoV and infected individuals”.

In the project led by Paula Soares and called “Is the thyroid gland the target of infection by SARS-CoV-2? Early identification and monitoring of thyroid dysfunction in patients with COVID-19”, the team of researchers will use FCT funding, worth 40 thousand euros, to investigate whether thyroid cells are susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection, inducing cell lesions that result in hypothyroidism in patients recovered from Covid-19.

For this, explains the researcher, “we propose the follow-up of patients recovered from Covid-19, assessing the levels of T3, T4, TSH and calcitonin, to determine if there is any indication of thyroid dysfunction (with the participation of Centro Hospitalar Universitário S. João and Centro Hospitalar Lisboa-Norte)”. For this project, adds Paula Soares, “we have also established a collaboration with Hospital de São Paulo in Brazil, and the Centro Hospitalar Universitário São João, which will allow us to study a unique series of autopsy thyroid glands from patients infected with SARS-CoV-2, and with the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto to study tissue and cellular changes and characterize the immune response”.

In total, this second edition of the RESEARCH 4 COVID-19 initiative received 495 applications, of which 471 were submitted for evaluation by external experts. The complete list of the 55 new projects supported by FCT in collaboration with the Agency for Clinical Research and Biomedical Innovation (AICIB) can be consulted here. These 55 research projects join the 66 projects funded by the 1st edition of the RESEARCH 4 COVID-19.