Watch: 'The novel coronavirus spike protein plays additional key role in illness'

Salk researchers and collaborators published a paper showing how the protein damages cells, "confirming COVID-19 as a primarily vascular disease."

The paper, published on April 30, 2021, in Circulation Research, "shows conclusively that COVID-19 is a vascular disease, demonstrating exactly how the SARS-CoV-2 virus damages and attacks the vascular system on a cellular level. The findings help explain COVID-19’s wide variety of seemingly unconnected complications, and could open the door for new research into more effective therapies."

In the new study, the researchers created a “pseudovirus” that was surrounded by SARS-CoV-2 classic crown of spike proteins, but did not contain any actual virus. Exposure to this pseudovirus resulted in damage to the lungs and arteries of an animal model—proving that the spike protein alone was enough to cause disease.