PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Christoph Kreer AU - Matthias Zehner AU - Timm Weber AU - Cornelius Rohde AU - Sandro Halwe AU - Meryem S. Ercanoglu AU - Lutz Gieselmann AU - Michael Korenkov AU - Henning Gruell AU - Philipp Schommers AU - Kanika Vanshylla AU - Veronica Di Cristanziano AU - Hanna Janicki AU - Reinhild Brinker AU - Artem Ashurov AU - Verena Krähling AU - Alexandra Kupke AU - Hadas Cohen-Dvashi AU - Manuel Koch AU - Simone Lederer AU - Nico Pfeifer AU - Timo Wolf AU - Maria J.G.T. Vehreschild AU - Clemens Wendtner AU - Ron Diskin AU - Stephan Becker AU - Florian Klein TI - Longitudinal isolation of potent near-germline SARS-CoV-2-neutralizing antibodies from COVID-19 patients AID - 10.1101/2020.06.12.146290 DP - 2020 Jan 01 TA - bioRxiv PG - 2020.06.12.146290 4099 - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/06/12/2020.06.12.146290.short 4100 - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/06/12/2020.06.12.146290.full AB - The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has unprecedented implications for public health, social life, and world economy. Since approved drugs and vaccines are not available, new options for COVID-19 treatment and prevention are highly demanded. To identify SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies, we analysed the antibody response of 12 COVID-19 patients from 8 to 69 days post diagnosis. By screening 4,313 SARS-CoV-2-reactive B cells, we isolated 255 antibodies from different time points as early as 8 days post diagnosis. Among these, 28 potently neutralized authentic SARS-CoV-2 (IC100 as low as 0.04 μg/ml), showing a broad spectrum of V genes and low levels of somatic mutations. Interestingly, potential precursors were identified in naïve B cell repertoires from 48 healthy individuals that were sampled before the COVID-19 pandemic. Our results demonstrate that SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies are readily generated from a diverse pool of precursors, fostering the hope of rapid induction of a protective immune response upon vaccination.Competing Interest StatementReported antibodies are in the process of being patented.