Translating bioactive peptides for COVID-19 therapy

COVID-19 (Coronavirus disease 2019) is a global pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), a positive-sense RNA virus. This virus has emerged as a threat to global health, social stability, and the global economy. This pandemic continues to cause rampant mortality worldwide with the dire urgency to develop novel therapeutic agents. To meet this task, this article discusses advances in the research and potential application of bioactive peptides for possible mitigation of infection by SARS-CoV-2. Growing insight into the molecular biology of SARS-CoV-2 has revealed potential druggable targets for bioactive peptides. Bioactive peptides with unique amino acid sequences can mitigate such targets including, type II transmembrane serine proteases (TMPRSS2) inhibition, furin cleavage, and renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system (RAAS) members. Based on current evidence and structure-function analysis, multiple bioactive peptides present potency to neutralize the virus. To date, no SARS-CoV-2-explicit drug has been reported, but we here introduce bioactive peptides in the perspective of their potential activity against SARS-CoV-2 infection.