Goh's BioComputing, Singapore.
Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN, USA.
Microb Pathog. 2020 Jul;144:104177. doi: 10.1016/j.micpath.2020.104177. Epub 2020 Mar 31.
The coronavirus (CoV) family consists of viruses that infects a variety of animals including humans with various levels of respiratory and fecal-oral transmission levels depending on the behavior of the viruses' natural hosts and optimal viral fitness. A model to classify and predict the levels of respective respiratory and fecal-oral transmission potentials of the various viruses was built before the outbreak of MERS-CoV using AI and empirically-based molecular tools to predict the disorder level of proteins. Using the percentages of intrinsic disorder (PID) of the nucleocapsid (N) and membrane (M) proteins of CoV, the model easily clustered the viruses into three groups with the SARS-CoV (M PID = 8%, N PID = 50%) falling into Category B, in which viruses have intermediate levels of both respiratory and fecal-oral transmission potentials. Later, MERS-CoV (M PID = 9%, N PID = 44%) was found to be in Category C, which consists of viruses with lower respiratory transmission potential but with higher fecal-oral transmission capabilities. Based on the peculiarities of disorder distribution, the SARS-CoV-2 (M PID = 6%, N PID = 48%) has to be placed in Category B. Our data show however, that the SARS-CoV-2 is very strange with one of the hardest protective outer shell, (M PID = 6%) among coronaviruses. This means that it might be expected to be highly resilient in saliva or other body fluids and outside the body. An infected body is likelier to shed greater numbers of viral particles since the latter is more resistant to antimicrobial enzymes in body fluids. These particles are also likelier to remain active longer. These factors could account for the greater contagiousness of the SARS-CoV-2 and have implications for efforts to prevent its spread.
冠状病毒（CoV）家族包括感染多种动物的病毒，包括人类，其呼吸道和粪-口传播水平因病毒自然宿主的行为和最佳病毒适应性而异。在 MERS-CoV 爆发之前，我们使用 AI 和基于经验的分子工具构建了一种模型，用于对各种病毒的相应呼吸道和粪-口传播潜力进行分类和预测。该模型使用 CoV 的核衣壳（N）和膜（M）蛋白的固有无序度（PID）百分比，将病毒轻松地聚类为三个组，其中 SARS-CoV（M PID = 8%，N PID = 50%）归入 B 类，其中病毒具有呼吸道和粪-口传播潜力的中间水平。后来，发现 MERS-CoV（M PID = 9%，N PID = 44%）归入 C 类，其中包括呼吸道传播潜力较低但粪-口传播能力较高的病毒。根据无序分布的特点，SARS-CoV-2（M PID = 6%，N PID = 48%）必须归入 B 类。然而，我们的数据表明，SARS-CoV-2 非常奇怪，它的外壳是冠状病毒中最难保护的之一（M PID = 6%）。这意味着它可能在唾液或其他体液中和体外高度有弹性。由于后者在体液中的抗菌酶更具抵抗力，感染的身体可能会释放出更多数量的病毒颗粒。这些颗粒也更有可能保持更长时间的活性。这些因素可能解释了 SARS-CoV-2 更强的传染性，并对预防其传播的努力产生影响。
