To accelerate the development of antiviral drugs, we generated human iPS cell-derived myeloid cell lines, which were susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection. Viral isolation using clinical specimens showed that some novel cell lines performed better than VeroE6/TMPRSS2. In addition, viral genome mutations that occurred during viral passaging did not happen in VeroE6/TMPRSS2 but accumulated in these cell lines, and those mutations were reported in clinical specimens. Furthermore, the antiviral efficacy of remdesivir differed among the cell types. These findings suggest that the novel myeloid cell lines may serve as a useful platform for virus isolation and the evaluation of antiviral responses.
Hishiki et al. (Tue,) studied this question.