Scientists are developing the first large panel of antibody treatments against the mosquito-borne chikungunya virus.
Chikungunya virus causes a flu-like illness with headaches and fever and then disabling joint pain that can last for years.
Up until now, there has been no effective treatment for the virus infection, and there is no licensed vaccine to prevent it, researchers said.
The development process in Vanderbilt University Medical Center's James Crowe's laboratory works like this: With a few ounces of blood from a previously infected person, researchers find chikungunya antibody - secreting cells, and then those cells are processed to retrieve their DNA and antibody genes.
The team started about two years ago acquiring blood from people who had chikungunya as children and has isolated 3 dozen chikungunya antibodies so far.
"Amazingly even decades after an infection, people still have cells in their blood making antibodies for chikungunya," Crowe said.
In what Crowe calls a "needle in the haystack" technology, his team is able to pull the B-cells (which secrete antibodies) from the blood, and using molecular biology, make antibody drugs.
About 1-2 ounces of blood is taken from each individual who has been infected.
The white and red blood cells are separated and only the white are retained. Once the cells start making antibodies, the cells are pulled out, and the genes are pulled from those.
They are testing in model systems, but the goal is to test one or more of the antibodies in human beings in about a year.
When current laboratory studies identify the very best drugs among the several dozen available, researchers will hand their gene findings over to a drug company for mass manufacturing of the treatments.
Crowe said using antibodies for treatment, and the body's natural immune defence, may be more effective than trying to develop a synthetic drug, which typically has a high rate of failure.
"It's not only a more natural way to make the drugs, it's a more powerful way, because human beings make the most amazing antibodies," he said.
Once the drug is developed and tested in humans, Crowe said it would be given to infected people early in the infection, prior to the debilitating joint pain.
"This would be similar to what you do with flu drugs right now - you develop a fever for a day, you take the test, and take the drug a day or two after," he said.
A vaccine that induces long-term protection could be more convenient and cost-effective in the long run than giving shots of the antibody to try to prevent infection, he said.
The research was published in the journal Cell Host and Microbe.
