Chasing New Therapeutics for COVID-19: Target Identification and Validation, Medicinal Chemistry and Drug Discovery Efforts

Dear Colleagues,

Over the last 20 years coronaviruses (CoVs) such as SARS-CoV, MERS-CoV and, lastly, SARS-CoV-2 (the etiological agent of COVID-19 disease) have recurrently emerged from animal reservoirs, causing outbreaks of severe respiratory syndromes in humans. COVID-19 represents the worst pandemic in the past 100 years, having triggered thus far about 100 million confirmed cases and >2 million deaths. Throughout 2020 the scientific community has been ramping-up efforts to identify COVID-19 treatments. Repurposed drugs, vaccines and antibody-based therapies have reached the clinic at an unprecedented speed. Mass vaccination campaigns have started on a global scale, but there are uncertainties concerning the duration of the vaccine-induced immunity and the efficacy that current vaccines may have against future CoV variants. As the world found itself quite unprepared in terms of antiviral drug armamentarium, broad-spectrum antivirals against current or future CoVs represent a valuable weapon of extreme medical and social importance.

In this Special Issue, we would like to provide an in depth look on potential targets, strategies for rational drug design, examples of hit/lead generation and optimization and recent medicinal chemistry efforts toward the evolution of small molecules acting as potential therapeutics against SARS-CoV-2. We also welcome studies on natural or nature-inspired derivatives as COVID-19 therapeutics. Likewise, concise review articles highlighting state-of-the-art in the field will be appreciated. Rather than just compiling a Special Issue we would like to use the opportunities offered by an Open Access Journal platform to further stimulate drug design and discovery efforts toward the development of novel therapeutic options tackling COVID-19 and future pathogenic CoVs.

Dr. Margherita Brindisi
Prof. Dr. Mark Brönstrup
Guest Editors

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