A recent fatal outbreak of novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, in Wuhan city, China has infected more than 2 million individuals with more than 156000 mortalities. Since the infection has crossed geographical barriers, the WHO permanently named the causing disease as COVID-2019. The current pandemic situation warrants an urgent need for therapeutic interventions. Genome sequencing and similarity of CoV-2 to previous SARS viruses provide an excellent opportunity for identifying drug targets and using them for drug repurposing studies. Recent on-going studies on COVID-19 from genome sequencing, structure biology and clinical studies of existing drugs have provided a plethora of knowledge and strategies to combat against it. Here in this webinar, the focus will be on COVID-19 biology and infection, its druggable proteins and roadmap on strategies of drug discovery and repurposing of existing approved drugs.
Outline of the webinar:
1.Understanding the Biology and Infection of COVID-19.
2.The drug targets of SARS-CoV-2 and its comparison with other viruses.
3. Current update and challenges on Drug Discovery and Repurposing efforts.
4. Opportunities: How Drug Development research in India and globally can change the future of COVID-19 pandemic.
By,
Dr. Dhaval Patel,
Assistant Professor,
Institute of Advanced Research,
Gandhinagar.