bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.01.07.425801; this version posted January 8, 2021. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. 1 Fibrinolysis influences SARS-CoV-2 infection in ciliated cells 2 3 Yapeng Hou1, Yan Ding1, Hongguang Nie1, *, Hong-Long Ji2 4 5 1Department of Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine, College of Basic Medical Science, China Medical 6 University, Shenyang, Liaoning 110122, China. 2Department of Cellular and Molecular Biology, University 7 of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler, Tyler, TX 75708, USA. 8 9 *Address correspondence to
[email protected] 10 11 bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.01.07.425801; this version posted January 8, 2021. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. 12 Abstract 13 Rapid spread of COVID-19 has caused an unprecedented pandemic worldwide, and an inserted furin site 14 in SARS-CoV-2 spike protein (S) may account for increased transmissibility. Plasmin, and other host 15 proteases, may cleave the furin site of SARS-CoV-2 S protein and subunits of epithelial sodium channels ( 16 ENaC), resulting in an increment in virus infectivity and channel activity. As for the importance of ENaC in 17 the regulation of airway surface and alveolar fluid homeostasis, whether SARS-CoV-2 will share and 18 strengthen the cleavage network with ENaC proteins at the single-cell level is urgently worthy of consideration.