TY  - JOUR
A1  - Liu, Fengming
A1  - Han, Kun
A1  - Blair, Robert
A1  - Kenst, Kornelia
A1  - Qin, Zhongnan
A1  - Upcin, Berin
A1  - Wörsdörfer, Philipp
A1  - Midkiff, Cecily C.
A1  - Mudd, Joseph
A1  - Belyaeva, Elizaveta
A1  - Milligan, Nicholas S.
A1  - Rorison, Tyler D.
A1  - Wagner, Nicole
A1  - Bodem, Jochen
A1  - Dölken, Lars
A1  - Aktas, Bertal H.
A1  - Vander Heide, Richard S.
A1  - Yin, Xiao-Ming
A1  - Kolls, Jay K.
A1  - Roy, Chad J.
A1  - Rappaport, Jay
A1  - Ergün, Süleyman
A1  - Qin, Xuebin
T1  - SARS-CoV-2 Infects Endothelial Cells In Vivo and In Vitro
JF  - Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology
N2  - SARS-CoV-2 infection can cause fatal inflammatory lung pathology, including thrombosis and increased pulmonary vascular permeability leading to edema and hemorrhage. In addition to the lung, cytokine storm-induced inflammatory cascade also affects other organs. SARS-CoV-2 infection-related vascular inflammation is characterized by endotheliopathy in the lung and other organs. Whether SARS-CoV-2 causes endotheliopathy by directly infecting endothelial cells is not known and is the focus of the present study. We observed 1) the co-localization of SARS-CoV-2 with the endothelial cell marker CD31 in the lungs of SARS-CoV-2-infected mice expressing hACE2 in the lung by intranasal delivery of adenovirus 5-hACE2 (Ad5-hACE2 mice) and non-human primates at both the protein and RNA levels, and 2) SARS-CoV-2 proteins in endothelial cells by immunogold labeling and electron microscopic analysis. We also detected the co-localization of SARS-CoV-2 with CD31 in autopsied lung tissue obtained from patients who died from severe COVID-19. Comparative analysis of RNA sequencing data of the lungs of infected Ad5-hACE2 and Ad5-empty (control) mice revealed upregulated KRAS signaling pathway, a well-known pathway for cellular activation and dysfunction. Further, we showed that SARS-CoV-2 directly infects mature mouse aortic endothelial cells (AoECs) that were activated by performing an aortic sprouting assay prior to exposure to SARS-CoV-2. This was demonstrated by co-localization of SARS-CoV-2 and CD34 by immunostaining and detection of viral particles in electron microscopic studies. Moreover, the activated AoECs became positive for ACE-2 but not quiescent AoECs. Together, our results indicate that in addition to pneumocytes, SARS-CoV-2 also directly infects mature vascular endothelial cells in vivo and ex vivo, which may contribute to cardiovascular complications in SARS-CoV-2 infection, including multipleorgan failure.
KW  - endothelial cell infection
KW  - animal models
KW  - SARS-CoV-2
KW  - aorta ring
KW  - hACE2
Y1  - 2021
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-241948
SN  - 2235-2988
VL  - 11
ER  -