On February 26, under the guidance of academician Zhong Nanshan, the research team led by Professor Zhao Jincun of SKLRD worked with the National Key Laboratory of Bio-safety Detection (P3 Laboratory) of Guangzhou Customs Technology Center, Guangzhou Institute of Biomedicine and Health Chinese Academy of Science and Guangdong Provincial Experimental Animals Monitoring Center to successfully establish the world’s first non-GMO mice animal model of COVID-19. It was verified that the novel coronavirus can be replicated with a high titer. The virus titer in each gram of tissue may reach 107 PFU (see the following figure). Mice showed corresponding clinical and pathological manifestations of pneumonia.

The novel coronavirus replication status in the lung after the model mice were infected

Compared with the conventional GMO mice animal model, this model takes a short cycle to build and does not require multiplication, which is suitable for promotion on a large scale in a short time. The establishment of the model has effectively eased the shortage of animal models in the novel coronavirus research of China, which is beneficial to the emergent in vivo verification of anti-virus drugs, protective neutralizing antibody and vaccine in China. Besides, the model can also be used in the subsequent researches of in vivo immune response and pathological mechanism of the novel coronavirus.

At present, the team is busily engaged in related in-depth research of animal model, with an aim to make a bigger contribution to the epidemic prevention and control and patient rescue of China. Meanwhile, it can also deepen our understanding of the pathological impact factors of novel coronavirus in our body and fill the gap of related key scientific problems.