Host factor PLAC8 is required for pancreas infection by SARS-CoV-2

BackgroundAlthough COVID-19 initially caused great concern about respiratory symptoms, mounting evidence shows that also the pancreas is productively infected by SARS-CoV-2. However, the severity of pancreatic SARS-CoV-2 infection and its pathophysiology are still under debate. Here we investigated the consequences of SARS-CoV-2 pancreatic infection and the role of the host factor Placenta-associated protein (PLAC8) MethodsWe analyzed plasma levels of pancreatic enzymes and inflammatory markers in a retrospective cohort study of 120 COVID-19 patients distributed in 3 severity-stratified groups. We studied the expression of SARS-CoV-2 and PLAC8 in the pancreas of deceased COVID-19 patients as well as in non-infected donors. We performed infection experiments in PLAC8 knock-out PDAC cell lines with full SARS-CoV-2 virus. ResultsWe found that analysis of circulating pancreatic enzymes aided the stratification of patients according to COVID-19 severity and predict outcomes. Interestingly, we found an association between PLAC8 expression and SARS-CoV-2 infection in postmortem analysis of COVID-19 patients. Using full SARS-CoV-2 infectious virus inoculum from Wuhan-1 and BA.1 strains, we demonstrated that PLAC8 is necessary for productive infection of PDAC cell lines. Finally, we observed an overlap between PLAC8 and SARS-CoV-2 immunoreactivities of the pancreas of deceased patients. ConclusionOur data indicate the human pancreas as a SARS-CoV-2 target with plausible signs of injury and demonstrate that the host factor PLAC8 is required for SARS-CoV-2 pancreatic infection, thus defining new target opportunities for COVID-19-associated pancreatic pathogenesis. Plain language summaryPrevious studies have shown that the pancreas is infected by SARS-CoV-2. However, none of these studies have described measurable pancreatic damage associated to COVID-19 severity and the pathogenesis of pancreatic SARS-CoV-2 infection remains largely unknown. Novel host factors have been proposed for SARS-CoV-2 infection of mainly the airway epithelium, none of them studied in the pancreas. Our study shows clinically relevant pancreatic damage associated with SARS-CoV-2 infiltration and assesses the predictive potential of circulating pancreatic enzymes to stratify patients according to COVID-19 severity and predict clinical outcomes in a cohort of 120 patients. Our data show that host factor Placenta-associated protein 8 (PLAC8) expression is linked to SARS-CoV-2 infection in postmortem analysis of COVID-19 patients and functionally demonstrated the full requirement of PLAC8 for SARS-CoV-2 pancreatic infection and viral replication. Our data confirm the human pancreas as a SARS-CoV-2 target with signs of injury unveiling the measurement of pancreatic enzymes for prognosis value and demonstrating that host factor PLAC8 is required for SARS-CoV-2 pancreatic infection defining new stratification and target opportunities for COVID-19-associated pancreatic pathogenesis.