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Comment by hprotagonist | Hacker News Reader

if mRNA works in anything close to a general case, i’m beginning to think that it might be as fundamentally transformative as the move from sulfa drugs to antibiotics was.

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I do not know if you aware or not, but there is a similar to mRNA vaccines, yet different (actually, almost mirror reflection of what mRNA vaccine is) invention called antisense drugs. Those are actually already used as antivirals.

Antisense drugs are the same biological material, but have a very different mechanism of effect.

Specifically, mRNA vaccines require an immune response to be effective. The mRNA (vaccine) encodes a viral protein, and the host (human) immune system still has to learn to respond to that protein.

Antisense drugs are much simpler, with no immune response required. The mRNA (the drug) itself simply binds to the target mRNA.

> Antisense drugs are much simpler, with no immune response required. The mRNA (the drug) itself simply binds to the target mRNA.

Does that make them a class of "cures" rather than "immunizations"? If I get infected with the same thing a year later, will I need another dose of the antisense drug?

Yes, they are "cures". Yes, you will.

Is it correct to say that an mRNA based vaccine wouldn't work for that virus anyway if you can get infected with the same thing a year later?

Vaccines have a shelf life in your body. It's good to get a titer every once in a while to make sure you don't need a booster. A year would be short though, unless you mean variants/mutations, which would really be reinfection, not with the same thing.

I know all that. Besides, one pedantic point - antisense are not the same to typical mRNA, they have thiophosphate group instead of normal phosphate in their backbone, or some other tweak to make them bind mRNA permanently.

Some of us don't know, so the extra detail is appreciated :)

Interesting re: the thiophosphate group. It sounds like it just floods your body with some mRNAs complementary to the viral mRNA that blocks it from getting turned into proteins by your cells' ribosomes?

Yes, pretty much; almost like NOPing out code in binary patches. However double check about the thiophosphates. I might be wrong. It is either Morpholinos are blockers and thios are promoting destruction of the mRNA or the opposite.

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