In a recent paper published in the journal Scientific Reports, researchers characterize five strains of gammacoronavirus (gCoV) and deltacoronavirus (dCoV) that have been detected in laughing gulls (Chroicocephalus ridibundus) and common gulls (Larus canus) in Poland.
The subfamily Orthocoronavirinae is composed of the genera Alpha-, Beta-, Gamma- and Deltacoronavirus, whose gCoV and dCoV infect wild birds. gCoV and dCoV have 3 subgenera and five and seven species respectively.
CoVs are positive-sense single-stranded ribonucleic acid (RNAss) viruses that mutate at the maximum imaginable rate due to the low constancy of their RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) machinery. Thus, CoVs potentially generate several viral variants during a short infection. cycle that can temporarily replace hosts.
The researchers received total genomic sequences (WGS) from five CoV samples. Four of the chosen dCoV strains were detected in three laughing gulls and one common gull, while one strain of gCoV originated in a laughing gull.
Twenty-seven samples with the highest viral load, as determined by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing, underwent next-generation sequencing (NGS). The de novo researchers then assembled raw readings into contigs. The BLAST set of used rules to compare those sequences with viral genome sequences in the GenBank database.
The samples with the highest homology were decided for further analysis. Specifically, using the MAFFT method, all nucleotide sequences were aligned. All similarities in nucleotide and amino acid sequences were decided and expressed as percentages.
These alignments were then incorporated into the IQ-TREE software to estimate the evolutionary model. We also identified any occasions for recombination within those CoV genomes, if any.
The genus Charadriiformes of the species Laridae was the main reservoir of gCoV and dCoV, with genome lengths of over 26,000 and about 23,000 nucleotides (nt), respectively. The four known Chinese CoV-like gull (BHG) genomes in this study were very similar to the genomes of 3 bird species from the United Arab Emirates and Chinese BHG, suggesting their close evolutionary dating and the possibility of interspecific transmission.
However, phylogenetic study of his WGS revealed a bifurcation within a common branch. Many amino acid changes within its Spike (S) protein have also been known, indicating that those dCoVs evolved within a single gull. In particular, Polish dCoV did, they come with any of the mutations described as host-specific receptors for gulls.
BHGdCoV/Poland/P350/2017 Polish known in December 2017, 35-40 km from where the recent maximum known CgdCoV/Poland/P005/2019 was recorded in January 2019. In comparison, gulls sampled in China’s Yunnan province were sampled in January-March 2021. from a single place.
Near-dCoV samples were taken from Middle Eastern birds over a two-year period. Overall, the dCoVs known in gulls in this study were very varied at the genomic level, raising the possibility that new serotype variants may arise with minimal mutations in S. protein.
Phylogenetic investigation of structural and non-structural genes of CGgCoV/Poland/P014/2019 revealed that it closely resembled duck coronavirus 2714 (DuCoV2714), detected in China in 2014. However, both viruses shared a low degree of homology with the S protein, which formed a distinct phylogenetic branch that is unrelated to any gCoV known to date. Some previous studies have known gCoV in wild birds in Australia and Canada.
The subfamily of gulls and terns can be discovered in many parts of the world, indicating that these birds are exceptionally diverse from an ecological point of view, while some of these birds are found exclusively in the marine environment, others in freshwater and others in both.
Some of those birds are in contact with humans and domestic animals. Most of those birds live in high-density colonies, which facilitates direct transmission of the virus and the spread of disease.
The dCoV and gCoV WGS described in this article are the first known in Polish gulls. Therefore, the effects of the study provide new data on the evolution and diversity of the CoV circulating in the Laridae family.
The genetic characteristics of these viruses demonstrate how these two distinct genera of CoV can simply co-infect an organism and create situations conducive to recombination events, which, in turn, can give rise to new CoV variants. In fact, researchers have recently reported simultaneous co-infection of Pacific black ducks with gCoV and dCoV in Australia.
Since porcine dCoVs, which probably evolved from avian dCoVs, can simply infect humans, it remains very important to frequently examine animal CoV reservoirs and expand knowledge about their increasing diversity and potential for zoonoses.
Written by
Neha is a virtual marketing professional founded in Gurugram, India. He holds a master’s degree from the University of Rajasthan with a specialization in Biotechnology in 2008. He has preclinical studies as part of his task of studies in the Decomponent of Toxicology of the prestigious Central Institute of Drug Research (CDRI), Lucknow, India. He also holds a certification in C programming.
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