The study, published in the journal NAR Molecular Medicine, describes how the virus interacts with the RNA of infected lung cells in an unprecedented way.

“SARS-CoV-2 doesn’t mess around. It interacts with the host cell in an extremely sophisticated and direct manner, manipulating its genetic material like no other pathogen does. We discovered that, through a very sophisticated pairing mechanism, the virus’s RNA interacts with different types of RNA in the infected cell, interfering with the functioning of the cellular machinery and blocking the production of interferon, one of the main antiviral defenses,” explains Marcelo Briones, coordinator of the Center for Medical Bioinformatics at the São Paulo Medical School (EPM-UNIFESP) and coordinator of the research.

According to Briones, although this is a fundamental biology study, the discovery may influence our understanding of the disease and the development of vaccines and treatments in the future.