Scientists Fear New COVID Strains Are Deadly—Just Like 2020 Wave


Authors: David Axe Fri, October 28, 2022 The new COVID-19 subvariants that are becoming dominant all over the world aren’t just more contagious than previous variants and subvariants—they might cause more severe disease, too. That’s an ominous sign if, as experts predict, there’s a new global wave of COVID in the coming months. It’s one thing to […]

Neuropathology and virus in brain of SARS-CoV-2 infected non-human primates


Authors: Ibolya Rutkai, Meredith G. Mayer, Linh M. Hellmers, Bo Ning, Zhen Huang, Christopher J. Monjure, Carol Coyne, Rachel Silvestri, Nadia Golden, Krystle Hensley, Kristin Chandler, Gabrielle Lehmicke, Gregory J. Bix, Nicholas J. Maness, Kasi Russell-Lodrigue, Tony Y. Hu, Chad J. Roy, Robert V. Blair, Rudolf Bohm, Lara A. Doyle-Meyers, Jay Rappaport & Tracy Fischer  Nature Communications volume 13, Article number: 1745 (2022)  Published: 01 April 2022 Abstract Neurological manifestations are a significant complication of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), but underlying mechanisms aren’t well […]

First case of postmortem study in a patient vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2


Author:TorstenHansenaUlfTitzeaNidhi Su AnnKulamadayil-HeidenreichbSabineGlombitzacJohannes, et. al. Highlights • We report on a patient with a single dose of vaccine against SARS-CoV-2. • He developed relevant serum titer levels but died 4 weeks later. • By postmortem molecular mapping, we found viral RNA in nearly all organs examined. • However, we did not observe any characteristic morphological features of COVID-19. • […]

The animal origin of SARS-CoV-2


Authors: Spyros Lytras1, Wei Xia2, Joseph Hughes1, Xiaowei Jiang3, David L. Robertson1  See all authors and affiliationsScience  27 Aug 2021:Vol. 373, Issue 6558, pp. 968-970 DOI: 10.1126/science.abh0117 Although first detected in December 2019, COVID-19 was inferred to be present in Hubei province, China, for about a month before (1). Where did this new human disease come from? To understand the origin […]

The OC43 human coronavirus envelope protein is critical for infectious virus production and propagation in neuronal cells and is a determinant of neurovirulence and CNS pathology


Authors:Jenny K.Stodola1GuillaumeDubois1AlainLe CoupanecMarcDesforgesPierre J.Talbot Highlights Coronavirus structural envelope (E) protein specific motifs involved in protein-protein interaction or in homo-oligomeric ion channel formation are needed for optimal production of recombinant infectious virus.• Fully functional E protein of HCoV-OC43 is crucial for viral propagation in the CNS and neurovirulence.• Fully functional E protein of HCoV-OC43 is crucial […]