Episode 18: Combatting COVID-19

Technology Today

Southwest Research Institute

Technology

4.8 • 19 Ratings

🗓️ 5 April 2020

⏱️ 37 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The novel Coronavirus is raging through communities around the world. It’s a virus never before seen in humans, and therefore, not recognized by our immune systems. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), people over 65 and those with underlying health conditions are at the highest risk. There is no vaccine or drug therapy to prevent or treat the illness caused by the virus, known as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). The heroes of this battle are the healthcare workers on the frontlines and the scientists and researchers in the labs developing a weapon to take down this persistent enemy. On this episode, we talk to two scientists joining the fight against COVID-19. SwRI scientist Dr. Jonathan Bohmann is using the Rhodium™ Software to analyze drug compounds that could successfully fight COVID-19. He’s working closely with Dr. Ricardo Carrion and his team from SwRI’s neighboring, San Antonio-based R&D organization Texas Biomedical Research Institute. Dr. Carrion explains how scientists everywhere are joining forces to eradicate the virus. Listen now as we discuss the global pandemic that has rapidly changed the way we live.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Scientists across the globe have joined the urgent fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
0:06.0	Coming up here from two researchers in the race to eradicate the virus and stay live.
0:16.0	We live with technology, science, engineering, and the results of innovative research every day.
0:23.6	Now let's understand it better. You're listening to the Technology Today podcast presented by Southwest Research Institute.
0:31.6	Hello and welcome to Technology Today. I'm Lisa Benya. Now usually we record in our studio, but today we are working from home, practicing social distancing, and recording our interviews by phone. So this episode may sound a little different. Of course, the coronavirus pandemic is changing how we do things and changing lives around the world. The illness caused by this virus is called coronavirus
0:55.5	disease 2019 or COVID-19. The numbers of COVID-19 cases and deaths are rising every day.
1:03.4	Our guest today have joined the race to stop the widespread coronavirus in its tracks.
1:08.5	Dr. Ricardo Garillon is a scientist, professor, and director of contract
1:12.9	research at Texas Biomedical Research Institute, which is an independent San Antonio-based
1:18.4	research and development organization. Texas Biomed's focus is infectious diseases.
1:24.4	Dr. Jonathan Bowman is a principal scientist at Southwest Research Institute.
1:29.4	They are combining their expertise to search for a coronavirus drug therapy. Thank you both for
1:35.2	joining us today. Let's start with Dr. Carrion. Regardless, your team has answered the
1:40.1	international call to tackle this virus. What is happening right now at Texas Biomed to mobilize
1:45.6	against the coronavirus? Thank you. We've been had a Texas Biomed wide effort to tackle
1:54.3	coronavirus research. So as you mentioned, our business is trying to eradicate infection
1:59.8	disease.
2:02.0	So this is part of our mission.
2:08.2	And with being led by our president, we are focusing on developing animal models,
2:13.2	animal models, because once we identify candidate drugs, so drugs,
2:18.6	so much what we're working with, we need to test them in a relevant animal system. So that will be the bottleneck in the future
2:20.8	is testing these drugs and these animal systems.
	...

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