Innate immune pathway modulator screen identifies STING pathway activation as a strategy to inhibit multiple families of arbo and respiratory viruses
Gustavo Garcia, Joseph Ignatius Irudayam, Arjit Vijey Jeyachandran, Swati Dubey, Christina C. Chang, Sebastian Castillo Cario, Nate Price, Sathya Arumugam, Angelica L. Marquez, Aayushi Shah, Amir Fanaei, Nikhil Chakravarty, Shantanu H. Joshi, Sanjeev Sinha, Samuel W. French, Mark S. Parcells, Arunachalam Ramaiah, Vaithilingaraja Arumugaswami
Abstract
RNA viruses continue to remain a threat for potential pandemics due to their rapid evolution. Potentiating host antiviral pathways to prevent or limit viral infections is a promising strategy. Thus, by testing a library of innate immune agonists targeting pathogen recognition receptors, we observe that Toll-like receptor 3 (TLR3), stimulator of interferon genes (STING), TLR8, and Dectin-1 ligands inhibit arboviruses, Chikungunya virus (CHIKV), West Nile virus, and Zika virus to varying degrees. STING agonists (cAIMP, diABZI, and 2',3'-cGAMP) and Dectin-1 agonist scleroglucan demonstrate the most potent, broad-spectrum antiviral function. Furthermore, STING agonists inhibit severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and enterovirus-D68 (EV-D68) infection in cardiomyocytes. Transcriptome analysis reveals that cAIMP treatment rescue cells from CHIKV-induced dysregulation of cell repair, immune, and metabolic pathways. In addition, cAIMP provides protection against CHIKV in a chronic CHIKV-arthritis mouse model. Our study describes innate immune signaling circuits crucial for RNA virus replication and identifies broad-spectrum antivirals effective against multiple families of pandemic potential RNA viruses.