STRA6, as A Novel Binding Receptor of COVID-19, A Breakthrough That could Explain COVID-19 Symptoms with Unknown Aetiology.
Authors: Elkazzaz Mahmoud , Haydara Tamer , Abo-Amer Yousry Esam-Eldin , Sahyon Heba , Shamkh Israa M , Magd Mohammed .F. Abo El , Ahmed Amr 
Published: September 2021

Background The COVID-19 pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has infected over 100 million people causing over 2.4 million deaths over the world, and it is still expanding. Although, ACE2 has been identified as the principal host cell receptor of 2019-nCoV, and it is thought to play a critical role in the virus's entrance into the cell and subsequent infection, many cells can be infected by COVID-19 while also expressing little or no ACE2. Furthermore, COVID-19 may case a variety of pre and post symptoms with unknown etiology . It was documented that COVID-19 infection leads to a loss of smell (anosmia) but The COVID-19 entry receptor, angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), is not expressed in the receptor of olfactory neurons, or its generation is limited to a minor fraction of these neurons. Moreover It was demonstrated that COVID-19 infects and kills lymphocyte thorough its ACE2 receptor. But numerous studies found that lymphocytes did not express ACE2 receptors or express it with a little, insufficient amount. It is clear from the information and findings presented and addressed below that COVID-19 not only binds to ACE2, but also to additional receptors, leading to existence of pre- and post-covid-19 symptoms which remain unexplained. As a result, discovering and identifying these receptors could lead to the development of new treatments that could suppress COVID-19 and reduce its severity and pathogenicityMethods The STRA6 receptor protein were submitted to the server for functional interaction associated network between partners for the STRING (Research Online of Interacting Genes/Proteins Data Basis version 10.0)13 .Docking study of each Spike -ACE 2 and STRA6 receptor protein were carried out using HDOCK server (http://hdock.phys.hust.edu.cn/). The binding mode of Spike -ACE 2 and STRA6 receptor protein is retrieved form the PDB https://www.rcsb.org/ with accession number (7DMU , 5sy1)ResultsOur results showed that COVID-19 Spike protein exhibited a high binding affinity for human STRA6 and a low binding energy with it. The docking score of COVID-19 spike protein with STRA6( -354.68) kcal/mol was higher than the docking score of spike protein with ACE2((-341.21 ) kcal/mol. Spike protein Receptor Binding Domain(RDB) of COVID-19 strongly and efficiently binds to STRA6 receptor, definitely to the RDB vital residues of RBP-binding motif located in STRA6 receptor. The docking of STRA6 target protein with spike viral protein revealed the involvement of the spike protein into the extracellular and membrane part of the STRA6 receptor and amino acids residues of STRA6 along with spike protein which make interactions and play an important role in formation of complexes. The corresponding distances about the residue contacts between proteins STRA6- Spike protein complex are documented here where the STRA6- Spike protein complexes binding site are the RDB of the CHOLESTEROL in STRA6 receptor which bind with interface residue( ARG 511A , VAL 512A THR 515A ALA 516A ASN 519A with interface residue degree (2.965 , 3.595 , 3.286 , 4.592 , and 4.235) representatively, also the ability of the spike to bind to RDB of the STRA 6 protein in the ILE 131C , MET 145C , HIS 86A with interface residue( 4.961 , 4.953 and 3.271) representatively. STRA6- Spike protein complex with PDB ID (5SY1 , 6LZG) representatively ,the chain A ,B with Align – length ( 582 ,194 ) then the quarry coverage of proteins 0.793 and 1.000 with sequence identity 96.2 % and 100,0 % representatively. The surface view of complex reveals that the binding pocket of STRA6- Spike protein and Spike ACE 2 complexes with RMSD (189.44 Å , 1.00 Å ) representatively and docking score (-341.21 ,-354.68) kcal/mol, the quality of the receptor and the ligand are LGscore and MaxSub ( 2.416 , 0.147 ) where the structure are correct representatively for the STRA6 receptor protein, and LGscore and MaxSub ,(5.056 ,0.217) .ConclusionSTRA6 is a critical regulator of many biological processes thorough initiating cellular retinol uptake, in different organs and tissues as in immune cells for improving the immune system homeostasis in various populations. Our docking study reveals that COVID-19 spike protein binds directly to The integral membrane receptor (STRA6) in addition to its binding sites of the cholesterol. STRA6 mediates cellular uptake of retinol (vitamin A) by recognizing a molecule of RBP-retinol to trigger release and internalization of retinol . Therefore COVID-19 may leads to downregulation of STRA6 receptor leading to inhibition the regulatory function of retinoic acid and cholesterol helps in existing of pre and post-covid-91 symptoms and complications including lymhopenia, Nuerogical disorders, Ineffective RIG-I pathway, Interferon inhibition, Cytokine storm, Diabetes, Hormonal imbalance, Thrombosis, and Smell loss. Therefore, we believe that this novel discovery that STRA6 receptor acts as a novel binding receptor for COVID-19 could explain many previously unexplained pre and post-covid-91 infection symptoms . Moreover, retinoic acid metabolism was found to be defective in COVID-19 (cytokine storm), sepsis, ARDS and SIRS .As a result reconstitution of the retinoid signaling may prove to be a valid strategy for COVID-19 management. We suggest that Vitamin A metabolites ,especially, retinoic acid will be promising and effective treatments for COVID-91 infection and its unknown aetiology symptoms. It worth mentioning that aerosolized all- trans retinoic acid and 13 cis retinoic acid is currently under clinical investigation (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05002530, NCT04353180)