ACE2 and viral infectious disease: To assess the role of SOCS3 in viral infection, we devised an ex vivo assay in which this gene was silenced by shRNA in HEK293T-Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme 2 (HEK-ACE2) epithelial cells, followed by infection with two strains of SARS-CoV-2 (Fig. 7H).