Anti-Microbial Activity

Studies on Cordyceps’ antiviral activity have shown to have potential in treating many viral infections. As the raw material for new antiviral drug development, Cordyceps was validated through long-observed antiviral effects by Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners (Holliday 2017). Different in vitro research studies have shown that cordycepin and its analogues have antiviral effect on several virus strains. Antiviral action was demonstrated for multiple viruses, including HIV, herpes simplex virus (HSV), Epstein–Barr virus (EBV), and influenza virus. Cordycepin’s antiviral efficacy is connected to its capability of inhibiting the virus’s RNA polymerase and reverse transcriptase (Mitchell et al. 1989; Muller et al. 1991; Ryu et al. 2014). Cordycepin is also a highly promising potential comprehensive anti-COVID-19 drug (Rabie 2022).

References:

• Holliday J. Cordyceps: A Highly Coveted Medicinal Mushroom. Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. (2017) D.C. Agrawal et al. (eds.), Medicinal Plants and Fungi: Recent Advances in Research and Development, Medicinal and Aromatic Plants of the World 4.
• Montefiori DC, Sobol RW, Li SW, Reichenbach NL, Suhadolnik RJ, Charubala R, Pfleiderer W, Modliszewski A, Robinson WE, Mitchell WM. Phosphorothioate and cordycepin analogues of 2′,5′-oligoadenylate: Inhibition of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 reverse transcriptase and infection in vitro. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA Medical Sciences (September 1989) 86:7191-7194.
• Muller WEG, Weiler BE, Charubala R, Pfleiderer W, Leserman L, Sobol RW, Suhadolnik RJ, Schrodert HC. Cordycepin analogs of 2’, 5’-oligoadenylate inhibit human immunodeficiency virus infection via inhibition of reverse transcriptase. Biochemistry (1991) 30(8):2027-2033.
• Ryu E, Son M, Lee M, Lee K, Cho JY, Cho S, Lee SK, Lee YM, Cho H, Sung GH, Kang H. Cordycepin is a novel chemical suppressor of Epstein-Barr virus replication. Oncoscience (2014) 1(12):866-881.
• Rabie AM. Potent Inhibitory Activities of the Adenosine Analogue Cordycepin on SARS-CoV‑2 Replication. ACS Omega (2022) 7:2960−2969.