Key mutations may cause cross-species transmission of new coronavirus

Science and Technology Daily, Beijing, July 13 (Reporter Liu Xia ) According to a report on the US "Science News" magazine website on the 12th, American scientists pointed out in the latest issue of "Cell" that a single mutation T372A may be the cause of the new coronavirus infecting human cells.
"The culprit", the latest research helps scientists develop better treatments or vaccines for new coronary pneumonia
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In the latest study, scientists from Virginia Tech analyzed 182,000 new coronavirus genomes to explore mutations that may help the virus adapt to and spread among humans
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Researchers speculate that the T372A mutation can reduce the sugar groups on the surface of the virus.
Because these sugar groups "prevent" the virus from entering the human body, removing them can enhance the virus's spike protein and the human host receptor ACE2 (with the help of this receptor virus).
To enter and infect human cells)
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Research leader and virologist James Wegg Lucarelli said: "Without this mutation, I don't think the new crown epidemic will be as serious as it is now, and the possibility of the new crown virus spreading globally is also less
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Andrew Docksay, a computational biologist at the University of Waterloo in Canada, was not involved in the study.
He pointed out that the latest findings indicate that this mutation is very important, but it may just be the "multiple factors" that caused the virus to jump from animals to humans.
One, "maybe not the only mutation
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It is not clear how the virus acquired the T372A mutation
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Lucarelli said that figuring out how an animal virus acquires the ability to infect humans will help researchers develop better antiviral drugs or vaccines
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