Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2021 Oct 18;9(10):1195.
doi: 10.3390/vaccines9101195.

Emerging SARS-CoV-2 Variants: A Review of Its Mutations, Its Implications and Vaccine Efficacy

Sindhu Ramesh  1 , Manoj Govindarajulu  1 , Rachel S Parise  1 , Logan Neel  1 , Tharanath Shankar  2 , Shriya Patel  3 , Payton Lowery  1 , Forrest Smith  1 , Muralikrishnan Dhanasekaran  1 , Timothy Moore  1
Affiliations
Review

Emerging SARS-CoV-2 Variants: A Review of Its Mutations, Its Implications and Vaccine Efficacy

Sindhu Ramesh et al. Vaccines (Basel). .

Abstract

The widespread increase in multiple severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants is causing a significant health concern in the United States and worldwide. These variants exhibit increased transmissibility, cause more severe disease, exhibit evasive immune properties, impair neutralization by antibodies from vaccinated individuals or convalescence sera, and reinfection. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has classified SARS-CoV-2 variants into variants of interest, variants of concern, and variants of high consequence. Currently, four variants of concern (B.1.1.7, B.1.351, P.1, and B.1.617.2) and several variants of interests (B.1.526, B.1.525, and P.2) are characterized and are essential for close monitoring. In this review, we discuss the different SARS-CoV-2 variants, emphasizing variants of concern circulating the world and highlight the various mutations and how these mutations affect the characteristics of the virus. In addition, we discuss the most common vaccines and the various studies concerning the efficacy of these vaccines against different variants of concern.

Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; mutations; vaccines; variants of concern; variants of interest.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Structure of SARS-CoV-2 genome with domain structure of the Spike protein.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Properties of Current Variants of Concern. * Severity is determined by an increased risk of hospitalization and increased risk of mortality.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Spike mutations in the variants of concern. Amino acid substitutions and their locations in the Spike protein (A). The following PDB files are used for structural illustrations: 7LWV for B.1.1.7 (Alpha); 7LYN for B.1.351 (Beta); 7LWW for B.1.1.28.1 P.1 (Gamma); and 6ZGE for B.1.617.2 (Delta). Chain A: green, Chain B: blue, Chain C: purple. (B) Side view and (C) top view. The figures were prepared using Schrodinger software, and PDB files were obtained from protein databank (https://www.rcsb.org/, accessed on 9 September 2021).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. WHO Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Dashboard with Vaccination Data. [(accessed on 24 September 2021)]. Available online: https://covid19.who.int/region/amro/country/us.
    1. Cascella M., Rajnik M., Aleem A., Dulebohn S.C., Di Napoli R. StatPearls. StatPearls Publishing LLC; Treasure Island, FL, USA: 2021. Features, Evaluation, and Treatment of Coronavirus (COVID-19) - PubMed
    1. Astrezeneca. The Natural Evolution of SARS-CoV-2: How Science Responds to These Challenges. [(accessed on 24 September 2021)]. Available online: https://www.astrazeneca.com/what-science-can-do/topics/disease-understan....
    1. Ju B., Zhang Q., Ge J., Wang R., Sun J., Ge X., Yu J., Shan S., Zhou B., Song S., et al. Human neutralizing antibodies elicited by SARS-CoV-2 infection. Nature. 2020;584:115–119. doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-2380-z. - DOI - PubMed
    1. McCallum M., De Marco A., Lempp F.A., Tortorici M.A., Pinto D., Walls A.C., Beltramello M., Chen A., Liu Z., Zatta F., et al. N-terminal domain antigenic mapping reveals a site of vulnerability for SARS-CoV-2. Cell. 2021;184:2332–2347.e16. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2021.03.028. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources