Cover your noses
The findings could offer one reason why COVID-19 is so infectious and potentially offer clues to more effective treatments, researchers say.
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In a study published in the European Respiratory Journal on Wednesday, the researchers found extremely high levels of “angiotensin converting enzyme II,” or ACE-2, only in the area of the nose responsible for smelling. The ACE-2 enzyme is thought to be the gateway that allows coronavirus to enter the cells of the body and cause an infection.
In fact, the levels of ACE-2 in these cells was between 200 and 700 times higher than other tissue in the nose and trachea, Chen said, and they found similarly high levels in all the samples of olfactory epithelium. The ACE-2 enzyme was not detected on olfactory neurons, the nerve cells that pass information about smells to the brain.
“The olfactory epithelium is quite an easy part of the body for a virus to reach, it’s not buried away deep in our body, and the very high levels of ACE-2 that we found there might explain why it’s so easy to catch COVID-19,” Chen said. Lane added that this research may enable doctors to tackle the infection with antiviral therapies delivered directly through the nose.