ArticleFrontiers in immunology2020
The Lung Macrophage in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: A Friend or a Foe?
Article in Frontiers in immunology, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 115 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
115 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 196 citations in OpenAlex.
- COVID-19 outbreak: history, mechanism, transmission, structural studies and therapeutics.Infection · 2021Pooled it
- Welding Fumes and SARS-CoV-2: A Dangerous Combination.Journal of occupational and environmental medicine · 2026Article
- Immune cell interactions and lung damage in SARS-CoV-2 special attention on monocytes/macrophages, T and B lymphocytes, dendritic cells and Toll-like receptors in SARS-CoV-2.American journal of clinical and experimental immunology · 2026Review
- Type I IFNs Decrease SARS-CoV-2 Replication in Human Cardiomyocytes and Increase Cytokine Production in Macrophages.Journal of clinical immunology · 2025Article
- Histopathological examination of lung from infant with lethal COVID-19 with special attention on pneumocytes type II and the immune infiltrate: a case study.Italian journal of pediatrics · 2025Article
- A Fraction ofInternational journal of molecular sciences · 2025Article
- Interaction of SARS-CoV-2 and SARS-CoV-2 vaccines with renin angiotensin aldosterone system, clinical outcomes, and angiotensin (1-7) as a physiological treatment recommendation: hypothesis and theory article.Frontiers in medicine · 2025Article
- Induction of protective immune responses at respiratory mucosal sites.Human vaccines & immunotherapeutics · 2024Review
- Cellular Nanoparticles Treat Coronavirus InfectionNano letters · 2024Article
- Engineering an inducible leukemia-associated fusion protein enables large-scale ex vivo production of functional human phagocytes.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Molecular mechanisms underlying SARS-CoV-2 hepatotropism and liver damage.World journal of hepatology · 2024Article
- Immunologic and inflammatory consequences of SARS-CoV-2 infection and its implications in renal disease.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Review
- Infectious Diseases.Advances in neurobiology · 2024Review
- Impact of age and sex on neuroinflammation following SARS-CoV-2 infection in a murine model.Frontiers in microbiology · 2024Article
- SARS-CoV-2 viral persistence in lung alveolar macrophages is controlled by IFN-γ and NK cells.Nature immunology · 2023Article
- Comparison of infection and human immune responses of two SARS-CoV-2 strains in a humanized hACE2 NIKO mouse model.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Review
- In the SARS-CoV-2 Pandora Pandemic: Can the Stance of Premorbid Intestinal Innate Immune System as Measured by Fecal Adnab-9 Binding of p87:Blood Ferritin, Yielding the FERAD Ratio, Predict COVID-19 Susceptibility and Survival in a Prospective Population Database?International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Article
- High SARS-CoV-2 tropism and activation of immune cells in the testes of non-vaccinated deceased COVID-19 patients.BMC biology · 2023Article
- SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein Activates Human Lung Macrophages.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Article
55 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Respiratory, circulatory, and renal failure are among the gravest features of COVID-19 and are associated with a very high mortality rate. A common denominator of all affected organs is the expression of angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), a protease responsible for the conversion of Angiotensin 1-8 (Ang II) to Angiotensin 1-7 (Ang 1-7). Ang 1-7 acts on these tissues and in other target organs via Mas receptor (MasR), where it exerts beneficial effects, including vasodilation and suppression of inflammation and fibrosis, along an attenuation of cardiac and vascular remodeling. Unfortunately, ACE2 also serves as the binding receptor of SARS viral spike glycoprotein, enabling its attachment to host cells, with subsequent viral internalization and replication. Although numerous reports have linked the devastating organ injuries to viral homing and attachment to organ-specific cells widely expressing ACE2, little attention has been given to ACE-2 expressed by the immune system. Herein we outline potential adverse effects of SARS-CoV2 on macrophages and dendritic cells, key cells of the immune system expressing ACE2. Specifically, we propose a new hypothesis that, while macrophages play an important role in antiviral defense mechanisms, in the case of SARS-CoV, they may also serve as a Trojan horse, enabling viral anchoring specifically within the pulmonary parenchyma. It is tempting to assume that diverse expression of ACE2 in macrophages among individuals might govern the severity of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Moreover, reallocation of viral-containing macrophages migrating out of the lung to other tissues is theoretically plausible in the context of viral spread with the involvement of other organs.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.