A collaborative endeavour between researchers from the University of Pennsylvania, The Wistar Institute, and Fraunhofer USA has determined that a novel chewing gum containing a plant-grown protein can trap the SARS-CoV-2 virus, reducing viral load in saliva and lowering Covid transmission.

This work turned out to be extremely beneficial in terms of the COVID-19 pandemic, as the receptor for ACE2 on human cells is known to bind to the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, with injections of ACE2 found to reduce viral load in people with severe infections.

Next, the team incubated samples from nasopharyngeal swabs from Covid-positive patients with the gum, demonstrating that the ACE2 present could neutralise SARS-CoV-2 viruses.

Additionally, the team performed further investigations where they modified viruses that are less pathogenic than SARS-CoV-2 to express the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein.

This enabled the team to demonstrate that the gum largely prevented Covid transmission into the cells, either by blocking the ACE2 receptor or binding directly to the spike protein.