People suffering from COVID-19 could have several different SARS-CoV-2 variants hidden away from the immune system in different parts of the body, finds new research.
Results showed that one can have several different virus variants in one’s body. Some of these variants may use kidney or spleen cells as their niche to hide, while the body is busy defending against the dominant virus type. This could make it difficult for the infected patients to get rid of SARS-CoV-2 entirely.
Using artificial virions the team were able to study the exact mechanism of the tailor-made spike protein pocket in viral infection. They demonstrated that upon binding of a fatty acid, the spike protein decorating the virions changed their shape. This switching ‘shape’ mechanism effectively cloaks the virus from the immune system.
Read the full University of Bristol press release
Papers:
- ‘Structural insights in cell-type specific evolution of intra-host diversity by SARS-CoV-2’ by K Gupta et al. in Nature Communications
- ‘Synthetic virions reveal fatty acid-coupled adaptive immunogenicity of SARS-CoV-2 spike glycoprotein’ by O Staufer et al. in Nature Communications
- ‘Free fatty acid binding pocket in the locked structure of SARS CoV-2 spike protein’ by C Toelzer et al. in Science.