Figure 2

Imatinib specifically inhibited lenti-Spike infection in both TMPRSS2-negative and -positive cells. (a) A scheme of lenti-Spike experiments. HEK293T-hACE2 cells were treated with the respective drugs and 2 h later were infected on-top with lenti-Spike. Medium was replaced after 8 h with fresh growth medium. After 1.5 days, Hoechst was added to stain the cell nuclei. Ratio between total number of cells (Hoechst) and infected cells was calculated based on the transduced GFP signal. (b) Lenti-Spike infection is inhibited by imatinib. Cells were treated with different doses of imatinib 2 h prior to lenti-Spike infection. Infection-efficiency was determined 1.5 days later. (c) Imatinib inhibition is lenti-Spike specific. Cells were transduced with lenti-VSVG. (d) Imatinib inhibited lenti-Spike infection in TMPRSS2-negative cells. HEK293T-hACE2 were treated with each 25 µM E64d, 50 µM camostat or 10 µM imatinib, and infected with lenti-Spike 2 h later. (e) Imatinib reduced lenti-Spike infection in TMPRSS2-positive cells. HEK293T-hACE2 were transfected with pEFIRES-TMPRSS2 plasmid and puromycin was added a day later to select for HEK293T-hACE2-TMPRSS2 cells. Cells were treated the next day and infected as described. In panels (b) and (c) data were analyzed by One-Way ANOVA with Dunnett posttest. In panels (d) to (e) student-t-test was performed; *p ≤ 0.05; **p ≤ 0.01; ***p ≤ 0.001; ***p ≤ 0.0001.