A team of Stony Brook University researchers is developing computer models that could help speed the discovery of drugs to combat the novel coronavirus responsible for COVID-19. The work is being carried out in collaboration with scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory and Argonne National Laboratory, and will be leveraging those laboratories’ computational resources and expertise. 

The researchers, led by Carlos Simmerling — Marsha Laufer Endowed Professor of Physical and Quantitative Biology, a professor of chemistry, and associate director of the Laufer Center at SBU — are working on models to better understand how the “spike” protein on the surface of the COVID-19 virus interacts with the cells it infects.