Beijing [China], February 22: HKU5-CoV-2 was first detected in bats in 2006 and is common in Pipistrellus bats in eastern and southern Asia.
The study was led by Shi Zhengli, a virologist nicknamed the "bat woman" for her extensive research on coronaviruses in bats, at the Guangzhou Laboratory, along with researchers from the Guangzhou Academy of Sciences, Wuhan University, and the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The team said HKU5-CoV-2 was able to bind to human angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE2), the same receptor used by SAR-CoV-2 to infect cells. HKU5-CoV-2 comes from the Merbecovirus subgenus, which also includes the virus that causes Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS).
The researchers found that when isolated from bat samples, HKU5-CoV-2 can infect human cells as well as artificially cultured clumps of cells or tissues that resemble miniature respiratory organs or intestines. "Bats Merbecoviruses have a high risk of infecting humans, either through direct transmission or through intermediate hosts," the team wrote in a paper published in the journal Cell on February 18.
Cell previously published a paper by a team from the University of Washington (USA) and Wuhan University concluding that although the HKU5 strain can bind to bat and other mammalian ACE2 receptors, they did not find "efficient" binding in humans. Meanwhile, Ms. Shi's team found that HKU5-CoV-2 is better adapted to human ACE2 than lineage 1 of the virus and "may have a broader host range and higher transmissibility across species". They said that HKU5-CoV-2 needs to be monitored more closely but assessed that the virus's capacity is "significantly lower" than that of SARS-CoV-2 and "the risk of HKU5-CoV-2 emerging in humans should not be exaggerated".
Source: Thanh Nien Newspaper
