“TLR7 belongs to the circle of relatives of Toll-like receptors and recognizes pathogens, followed by the upcoming activation of the innate immune system,” says Dr. Brown. Kerstin Ludwig from the Institute of Human Genetics at the University Hospital Bonn. Since the TLR7 gene occurs due to mutations, the popularity of the SARS-CoV-2 virus would possibly be affected. This results in a weaker defense of immune cells: the virus receives less resistance.
The study confirms at the population point what was already known of individual cases: a genetically mediated absence of TLR7 is a major threat to severe COVID-19. On the one hand, this information can be used in the context of forecasting individual threats. On the other hand, this discovery now makes it possible to continue work on the pathological mechanism, the clarification of which could be the basis for the progression of drugs for COVID-19.
21 contributions from 12 countries
The existing study was only possible because genetic and clinical information was pooled from as many people with COVID-19 as possible. 21 studies from twelve countries contributed, plus one from Germany. This German contribution came from the “DeCOI” initiative (www. decoi. eu) and coordinated through Dr. Kerstin Ludwig from the University of Bonn with Prof. Dr. Olaf Rieß (University of Tübingen) and Dr. Olaf Rieß (University of Tübingen)Eva Schulte (Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich).
“Together, we collected DNA from subjects at several German sites of the DeCOI consortium, generated genome series knowledge with the help of next-generation sequencing competence centers in Cologne, Tübingen and Bonn, and then merged the knowledge in Bonn,” Ludwig reports. , member of the ImmunoSensation2 group of excellence at the University of Bonn. Dr. Then, Axel Schmidt of the Institute of Human Genetics analyzed DeCOI’s gigantic body of knowledge and coordinated the joint research with other foreign groups.
Genetic factors
Shortly after the pandemic began, the foreign COVID-19 Host Genetics (COVID-19 HGI) initiative was formed, bringing in mixed cohorts from around the world to examine host genetic points. In recent months, scientists have already discovered several points of genetic threat that are not unusual in the population. Individually, they do not cause disease, but they do so in combination with other points of genetic and clinical threat, such as male sex, complex age or obesity.
On the other hand, it is expected that there will also be patients in whom very rare variants confer a maximum threat of severe COVID-19. To examine this, the COVID-19 HGI WES/WGS subgroup was created. WES/WGS knowledge research comes with massive amounts of knowledge and bioinformatics requirements.
In addition, this genetic knowledge can not only be shared with global groups, but will have to be analyzed at individual examination sites and then combined at a target level to avoid bias, for example, due to other technological methods. The researchers compare the genetic variants contribute in each of the genes of the total genome in each of the cohorts and their frequency between severe patients and controls.
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