Oct 20, 2020 14:00:00

A 14-year-old girl identifies 'a molecule that may lead to a therapeutic drug for new coronavirus infection' and wins a prize of 2.6 million yen

A 14-year-old junior high school girl about the new coronavirus infection (COVID-19), which has surpassed

10,000 new infections in the UK and 30,000 in France and is re-spreading in Europe Won the student science contest by identifying 'molecules that may lead to therapeutic drugs'. I won a prize of 25,000 dollars (2.6 million yen).

2020 Video Challenge entry | Young Scientist Lab
https://www.youngscientistlab.com/index.php/entry/2397

3M Young Scientist Challenge winner is Anika Chebrolu, who won for a coronavirus discovery --CNN
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/10/18/us/anika-chebrolu-covid-treatment-award-scn-trnd/index.html

America's Top Young Scientist of 2020: 14-Year-Old Researches Spike Protein of SARS-CoV-2 Virus to Develop Novel Antiviral Drug to Combat Spread of COVID-19 | BioSpace
https://www.biospace.com/article/releases/america-s-top-young-scientist-of-2020-14-year-old-researches-spike-protein-of-sars-cov-2-virus- to-develop-novel-antiviral-drug-to-combat-spread-of-covid-19 /

At the 3M Young Scientist Challenge, an American student science contest co-sponsored by 3M , a global chemical and electrical material manufacturer known for post-it notes and scotch tape, and Discovery Education, an organization that supports digital learning such as remote learning. Anika Chebrol, 14, who attends Nelson Junior High School in Texas, won the championship and won a prize of $ 25,000.

Chebrol's research is to identify lead compounds that can selectively bind to the new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) by scrutinizing existing databases. In the following movie, Mr. Chebrol himself explains his research.

3MYSC Submission --Molecular Docking Study of Hemagglutinin Protein to Develop Anti- Influenza Drug --YouTube


In front of the poster, Mr. Chebrol talks about his research.

Mr.

Chebrol maps the three-dimensional structure of the protein downloaded from the Protein Data Bank with FTmap and identifies the locations where intervention is possible with low-molecular-weight compounds.

Subsequently, drug molecules were carefully selected from

ZINC 15 , a database of over-the-counter drug compounds, based on Lipinski's rule, and 250,000 virus-effective molecules were selected.

Then, 250,000 selected molecules are analyzed with

CLC Drug Discovery Workbench , a tool that can visually analyze the binding between proteins and ligands ....

Six final candidates were selected by applying admetSAR 2.0 , a tool for evaluating ADMET characteristics, to 100 molecules that had a particularly high affinity for the intervening sites identified by the FTmap .

These six

finalists were entered into PyRx , a virtual screening software for drug discovery , to identify lead compounds.

Dr. Cindy Moss, who was in charge of the contest judge, said, 'Mr. Chebrol's research is a comprehensive study of a large number of databases, and Mr. Chebrol himself has a deep understanding of innovation and is good at communication skills. Her willingness to use her own time and talents to make the world a better place gives us hope. ' 'I think the fact that my research has been featured in many media reflects our desire to end the COVID-19 pandemic,' said Chebrol. 'I hope the lead molecule announced this time can be used for actual drug discovery,' he said.