To efficiently infect human cells, SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is able to use a receptor called Neuropilin-1, which is very abundant in many human tissues including the respiratory tract, blood vessels and neurons.
To efficiently infect human cells, SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is able to use a receptor called Neuropilin-1, which is very abundant in many human tissues including the respiratory tract, blood vessels and neurons. The breakthrough discovery was made by a German-Finnish team of researchers led by neuroscientists Mika Simons ,Technical University of Munich, Germany and virologist Giuseppe Balistreri, University of Helsinki, Finland.
Why is the new coronavirus so infectious?
"That SARS-CoV-2 uses the receptor ACE2 to infect our cells was known, but viruses often use multiple factors to maximize their infectious potential" says Dr. Giuseppe Balistreri, head of the research group Viral Cell Biology at the University of Helsinki involved in the study.
Unlike other respiratory viruses, SARS-CoV-2 infects also the upper respiratory system including the nasal mucosa and consequently spreads rapidly. "This virus is able to leave our body even when we simply breath or talk", Balistreri adds. "The starting point of our study was the question why SARS-CoV, a coronavirus that led to a much smaller outbreak in 2003, and SARS-CoV-2, spread in such a different way even if they use the same main receptor ACE2", explains Ravi Ojha, a young researcher in the Balistreri's team, and one of the main contributors of the study.
Read more at University of Helsinki
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