Mutation in MERS virus

[Shannon Bennett]

Researchers find two critical mutation in MERS virus.

http://www.news-medical.net/news/201...to-humans.aspx

Researchers have identified two critical mutations allowing the deadly Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) virus to transmit from bats to humans. The findings were published in the most recent edition of the Journal of Virology.

[Emily]

Li's previous research, published in Science in 2005, showed two mutations were critical for SARS to transmit from its animal reservoir in palm civets to humans. Different from the two mutations identified in MERS, the two mutations identified in SARS allowed the virus to attach to the human receptor with much enhanced affinity. Therefore, MERS and SARS have used two different evolutionary strategies to achieve efficient infections of human cells.

Li's previous research was disproved, (unfortunately after many pet cats and dogs were needlessly killed.)

The analysis tracing the viruses? paths through human and animal hosts counters assertions that SARS was eradicated in 2004 when thousands of palm civet cats in China were identified as the original source and killed in an effort to eliminate the risk of new outbreaks.

According to this new analysis, humans actually appear to be the source of the virus found in those civets, a wild game animal considered a delicacy in southern China.

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/SARStree.htm

So the movement of both MERS and SARS into humans could be more alike than different. That's why I'm skeptical of the MERS focus on camels.

More striking still is that one of them, dubbed SL-CoV-WIV1, is able to use the human angiotensin converting enzyme II (ACE2) to enter cells -- the same molecule used by the SARS coronavirus. The findings suggest that "SARS-like coronaviruses are diverse and abundant in bats in Asia, and the potential for future spillover remains high," Daszak said in a statement. The current outbreak of Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) is caused by a coronavirus thought to have originated in bats, but investigators haven't pinned down a pathway from the animals to humans. The current findings, Daszak and colleagues argued, suggests that an intermediate host may not be necessary.

http://www.medpagetoday.com/LabNotes/LabNotes/42676

Sometimes the existence of a novel pathogen in a species associated with humans is the result of a 'reverse zoonosis.'