Recently discovered antibodies can neutralize nearly all known variants of the coronavirus and may have the ability to prevent future outbreaks of the coronavirus, according to a new study.

The study published in the peer-reviewed journal "Science Advances" on Thursday describes how a team of researchers managed to isolate potent neutralizing antibodies from a recovering SARS patient who had been vaccinated against the coronavirus and showed notable breadth against known sarbecoviruses, or respiratory viruses such as SARS and corona.

The international team was led by Duke University Medical School, and included scientists from the National University of Singapore, the University of Melbourne in Australia, and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in the United States.

By isolating antibodies from the SARS survivor who was vaccinated against corona, the researchers found that the combination of previous coronavirus infection and vaccination generated a remarkably broad and strong antibody response, capable of stopping nearly all related coronaviruses that were tested.

The senior author, Wang Lanfang, a professor and bat virus expert in the Emerging Infectious Diseases Program at Duke University, said in a press release, “This work provides encouraging evidence that coronavirus vaccines are possible if they can educate the human immune system in the right way.”

In total, the team obtained six antibodies capable of neutralizing multiple coronaviruses, including the coronavirus and its alpha, beta, gamma, delta, and omicron variants, the original SARS virus, along with several other animal coronaviruses transmitted from bats and pangolins.

Co-author Xia Wan Ni, a former postdoctoral fellow in Lanfang's lab who now works with Singaporean startup "COV Biotechnology," stated that three antibodies stood out as exceptionally broad and potent, capable of neutralizing all SARS-related viruses tested at very low concentrations.

The researchers found that the strongest antibody, called "E7," was able to neutralize both SARS and corona as well as animal sarbecoviruses and new corona variants.

The study indicates that "E7" was shown to target a region of the spike protein of the coronavirus and prevents the conformational change that the virus requires to infect cells and cause disease.

Xia said, “The neutralizing strength and breadth of the antibody exceeded any other SARS-related coronavirus antibodies we encountered. It has maintained activity against the latest subvariants of omicron, while most other antibodies lose their effectiveness.”

The results of the study provide a basis for designing vaccines and drugs that work against current and future coronavirus variants and threats.

Wang stated, “This work demonstrates that inducing broad-spectrum neutralizing antibodies against sarbecoviruses is possible; it just needs the right immune sequence and delivery method, which provides hope that a universal coronavirus vaccine design can be achieved.”

The researchers plan to further assess the potential of the E7 antibody against current and future coronaviruses.