Antiviral activity of piracetam, Y.M. centifanto, tulane university school of medicine, new orleans, louisiana (USA)
Antiviral Research, Volume 17, Supplement 1, March 1992, Page 114

here is the paper, it is only half a page long:

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Antiviral Activity of Piracetam, Y.M. Centifanto, Tulane University School
of Medicine, New Orleans, Louisiana (USA)

The effect of Piracetam (2-oxo-i pyrrodiline acetamide), a nootropic
drug, on herpes simplex virus (HSV) infections was examined. We found that
HSV replication on Vero cells was totally inhibited by the drug, even when
added 6 hr pi. The drug needed continuous contact with the infected cell
to exert its effect, suggesting a virustatic mode of action. Three types
of experiments were conducted for the in vivo studies: i) In the hairless
guinea pig model of herpetic recurrent disease, cellophane stripping of a
previously infected area induces the appearance of recurrent herpetic
lesions. Topical application of a 10% Piracetam to these areas inhibited
lesion formation by 70% as compared to the control; 2) Using the same system,
the drug at 20 mg/kg was given either orally or in the drinking water,
prevented lesion formation; 3) Female guinea pigs were infected in the
genital area with HSV-I (333) strain. After the primary lesions subsided,
and in the period of spontaneous recurrent lesions, the animals were given
oral doses of Piracetam for three consecutive weeks. We found that the
drug was effective in reducing the number of recurrent lesions on the
treated animals by more than 50%. Additional experiments with different
doses are now in progress. It is important to note that Piracetam has a
more definite inhibitory action on recurrent lesions as compared to a very
mild action on primary disease. We theorize that this beneficial effect on
the prevention of recurrent lesions may be related to their reported
cholinergic functions.
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Unfortunately the "Additional experiments" cannot be found. None of the other papers released by Y.M. Centifanto contained any mention of piracetam.

There is probably no research on this because there are more effective antivirals, and no incentive to fund research because piracetam is not owned by one company.

Do racetams prevent the common cold?! We'll never know.

everything is antiviral, you can find an abstract on potatoes being antiviral.... lets see......

yep i was right (i guessed potatoes without even looking first):

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?D...Pubmed_RVDocSum

Ability of orally administered IFN-alpha-containing transgenic potato extracts to inhibit Listeria monocytogenes infection.
Ohya K, Matsumura T, Itchoda N, Ohashi K, Onuma M, Sugimoto C.

Department of Disease Control, Graduate School of Veterinary Medicine, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0818, Japan.

Type I interferons (IFN-alpha/beta) were originally thought to be antiviral cytokines, but it has recently been reported that they also play an important role in potentiating innate and adaptive immune responses. Moreover, several studies have shown that the oral administration of type I IFN ameliorates various biologic activities. Here, we studied the ability of orally administered IFN-alpha to protect mice from systemic Listeria monocytogenes infection. Daily oral administration of purified natural IFN-alpha at a concentration of 1000 international units (IU)/20 microl reduced the bacterial burden in infected organs. We also examined the protective effect of IFN-alpha expressed in transgenic potato plants. A much lower concentration of IFN-alpha (20 IU/ 20 microl) in the plant extracts was almost as protective as much higher concentrations of purified natural IFN-alpha. Our observations indicate that transgenic cytokine-expressing plants can be used prophylactically as edible pharmaceuticals to enhance systemic defense responses in humans and animals.