PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Jim Baggen
AU  - Leentje Persoons
AU  - Sander Jansen
AU  - Els Vanstreels
AU  - Maarten Jacquemyn
AU  - Dirk Jochmans
AU  - Johan Neyts
AU  - Kai Dallmeier
AU  - Piet Maes
AU  - Dirk Daelemans
TI  - Identification of TMEM106B as proviral host factor for SARS-CoV-2
AID  - 10.1101/2020.09.28.316281
DP  - 2020 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 2020.09.28.316281
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/09/28/2020.09.28.316281.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/09/28/2020.09.28.316281.full
AB  - The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is responsible for worldwide economic damage and nearly one million deaths. Potent drugs for the treatment of severe SARS-CoV-2 infections are not yet available. To identify host factors that support coronavirus infection, we performed genome-wide functional genetic screens with SARS-CoV-2 and the common cold virus HCoV-229E in non-transgenic human cells. These screens identified PI3K type 3 as a potential drug target against multiple coronaviruses. We discovered that the lysosomal protein TMEM106B is an important host factor for SARS-CoV-2 infection. Furthermore, we show that TMEM106B is required for replication in multiple human cell lines derived from liver and lung and is expressed in relevant cell types in the human airways. Our results identify new coronavirus host factors that may potentially serve as drug targets against SARS-CoV-2 or to quickly combat future zoonotic coronavirus outbreaks.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.