RNA: The most attractive target in recent viral diseases

Abstract

AbstractAs an expert in the field of drug design and discovery, I tried, in this up‐to‐date perspective or commentary article, to recap and shed light on the previous and latest revolutionary strategies employed in medicinal and therapeutic chemistry to target the principal viral weapon used by virulent RNA viruses (e.g., the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 “SARS‐CoV‐2”) to infect humans and spread infections, the genomic RNA strands. These strategies act by taking advantage of the weakness points of this attractive bioweapon to disable or attack it (itself), accordingly stop the entire viral reproduction, and effectively end the severe microbial infections such as the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19). The generation of respective slightly falsely‐weaved RNA strands, either endogenously or exogenously, is the principal key for designing most of these therapeutic approaches.