Smell and Taste Changes: The Best Way to Guide Lockdown Policy?

For the original article, please follow this link. This article was reviewed by Dr. Emily Bowman, one of our subject matter experts. Brief Summary:  This study by Denis Pierron et al. investigated the reliability of self-reported smell and taste change numbers across France as an indicator to predict surges of COVID-19 hospital admissions and a basis for … Continue reading Smell and Taste Changes: The Best Way to Guide Lockdown Policy?

Potential COVID-19 Drug Target: 3CL Mpro

For the original article, please follow this link. This post was reviewed by Dr. Kelly Summers and Dr. Andrey Kovalevsky, some of our subject matter experts. Brief Summary 3CL Mpro is a SARS-CoV-2 enzyme (the virus causing COVID-19) that processes other SARS-CoV-2 polyproteins (by slicing them up into smaller pieces) critical for the viral life cycle … Continue reading Potential COVID-19 Drug Target: 3CL Mpro

COVID-19 Transmission: Is the Air Contaminated?

This post was reviewed by Dr. Carolina Camargo, one of our subject matter experts. For the original article, please follow this link. For the biological definitions of aerosols and respiratory droplets, please visit this page. Brief Summary This case study1 at two Wuhan Hospitals and public areas nearby detected the genetic material of SARS-CoV-2 in the air. … Continue reading COVID-19 Transmission: Is the Air Contaminated?

Why Does SARS-CoV-2 Infect Specific Cell Types?

This post has been reviewed by one of our subject matter experts, Dr. Phil Lange. For the original article, please follow this link: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbrc.2020.03.044. The research was conducted by the National Clinical Research Center for Infectious Disease. Introduction Viruses spread within our bodies by using the components of our cells to replicate themselves. Different viruses … Continue reading Why Does SARS-CoV-2 Infect Specific Cell Types?

Researchers at Hunan University Analyze Cellular Receptor ACE2 to Predict Possible Animals That Gave Us Coronavirus

Original scientific paper with images accessible via the following link: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.micinf.2020.03.003 As researchers at the Hunan University in Changsha China suggest, the reservoir species for human coronavirus (COVID-19) is the Chinese horseshoe bat because of high genetic similarity (closely matched gene sequences) between COVID-19 and bat coronavirus (BatCoV RaTG13). The reservoir species has immunity to … Continue reading Researchers at Hunan University Analyze Cellular Receptor ACE2 to Predict Possible Animals That Gave Us Coronavirus