Cargando…

Carrageenan from Gigartina skottsbergii: A Novel Molecular Probe to Detect SARS-CoV-2

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused an unprecedented health and economic crisis, highlighting the importance of developing new molecular tools to monitor and detect SARS-CoV-2. Hence, this study proposed to employ the carrageenan extracted from Gigartina skottsbergii algae as a probe for SARS-CoV-2 vir...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Zank, Patrícia Daiane, Cerveira, Milena Mattes, dos Santos, Victor Barboza, Klein, Vitor Pereira, de Souza, Thobias Toniolo, Bueno, Danielle Tapia, Poletti, Tais, Leitzke, Amanda Fonseca, Luehring Giongo, Janice, Carreño, Neftali Lenin Villarreal, Mansilla, Andrés, Astorga-España, Maria Soledad, de Pereira, Claudio Martin Pereira, Vaucher, Rodrigo de Almeida
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10046870/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36979590
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/bios13030378
Descripción
Sumario:The COVID-19 pandemic has caused an unprecedented health and economic crisis, highlighting the importance of developing new molecular tools to monitor and detect SARS-CoV-2. Hence, this study proposed to employ the carrageenan extracted from Gigartina skottsbergii algae as a probe for SARS-CoV-2 virus binding capacity and potential use in molecular methods. G. skottsbergii specimens were collected in the Chilean subantarctic ecoregion, and the carrageenan was extracted —using a modified version of Webber’s method—, characterized, and quantified. After 24 h of incubation with an inactivated viral suspension, the carrageenan’s capacity to bind SARS-CoV-2 was tested. The probe-bound viral RNA was quantified using the reverse transcription and reverse transcription loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) methods. Our findings showed that carrageenan extraction from seaweed has a similar spectrum to commercial carrageenan, achieving an excellent proportion of binding to SARS-CoV-2, with a yield of 8.3%. Viral RNA was also detected in the RT-LAMP assay. This study shows, for the first time, the binding capacity of carrageenan extracted from G. skottsbergii, which proved to be a low-cost and highly efficient method of binding to SARS-CoV-2 viral particles.