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Review
. 2020 Jul 29;17(1):117.
doi: 10.1186/s12985-020-01369-z.

SARS-CoV-2: characteristics and current advances in research

Yicheng Yang  1   2 , Zhiqiang Xiao  3 , Kaiyan Ye  4 , Xiaoen He  2 , Bo Sun  1 , Zhiran Qin  2 , Jianghai Yu  2 , Jinxiu Yao  5 , Qinghua Wu  2 , Zhang Bao  6 , Wei Zhao  7
Affiliations
Review

SARS-CoV-2: characteristics and current advances in research

Yicheng Yang et al. Virol J. .

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by SARS-CoV-2 infection has spread rapidly across the world and become an international public health emergency. Both SARS-CoV-2 and SARS-CoV belong to subfamily Coronavirinae in the family Coronaviridae of the order Nidovirales and they are classified as the SARS-like species while belong to different cluster. Besides, viral structure, epidemiology characteristics and pathological characteristics are also different. We present a comprehensive survey of the latest coronavirus-SARS-CoV-2-from investigating its origin and evolution alongside SARS-CoV. Meanwhile, pathogenesis, cardiovascular disease in COVID-19 patients, myocardial injury and venous thromboembolism induced by SARS-CoV-2 as well as the treatment methods are summarized in this review.

Keywords: COVID-19; Cardiovascular disease; Cytokine storm; Myocardial injury; SARS-CoV-2; Treatment; Venous thromboembolism.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Distinctions of amino acid composition and protein structure. Differences between SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 are mainly in S protein, ORF8 protein and ORF3b protien. a The external subdomain of the receptor binding domain of the spike protein in SARS-CoV-2 shares only 40% amino acid identity with other SARS-related coronaviruses; b ORF8 in SARS-CoV-2 does not contain a known functional domain or motif while in SARS-CoV ORF8b the presence of the aggregation motif VLVVL has been found; c The ORF8a protein is absent in SARS-CoV-2; There are 121 amino acids that encode the 8b protein in SARS-CoV-2, while only 84 are involved in SARS-CoV. d ORF3b of SARS-CoV-2 has a novel protein with four helices and 67 amino acids that encode the 3b protein in SARS-CoV-2 while 154 amino acids are involved in SARS-CoV
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Potential mechanisms of myocardial injury induced by SARS-CoV-2. a SARS-CoV-2 damages cardiomyocytes directly; b SARS-CoV-2 infection reduces ACE2 thus AngII is up-regulated. Kinases in cardiomyocytes are activated to induce an inflammation effect causing myocardial injury; c Inflammatory cytokines release; d Oxygen supply-demand imbalance
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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