Protein Structure
and Sequence Reanalysis of 2019-nCoV
Genome Refutes Snakes as Its Intermediate Host and the Unique Similarity
between Its Spike Protein Insertions and HIV‑1
posted on 2020-03-24, 11:05authored byChengxin Zhang, Wei Zheng, Xiaoqiang Huang, Eric W. Bell, Xiaogen Zhou, Yang Zhang
As the infection of 2019-nCoV coronavirus
is quickly developing
into a global pneumonia epidemic, the careful analysis of its transmission
and cellular mechanisms is sorely needed. In this Communication, we
first analyzed two recent studies that concluded that snakes are the
intermediate hosts of 2019-nCoV and that the 2019-nCoV spike protein
insertions share a unique similarity to HIV-1. However, the reimplementation
of the analyses, built on larger scale data sets using state-of-the-art
bioinformatics methods and databases, presents clear evidence that
rebuts these conclusions. Next, using metagenomic samples from Manis javanica, we assembled a draft genome of the 2019-nCoV-like
coronavirus, which shows 73% coverage and 91% sequence identity to
the 2019-nCoV genome. In particular, the alignments of the spike surface
glycoprotein receptor binding domain revealed four times more variations
in the bat coronavirus RaTG13 than in the Manis coronavirus
compared with 2019-nCoV, suggesting the pangolin as a missing link
in the transmission of 2019-nCoV from bats to human.