Molecular analysis of binding region of an ACE2 as a receptor for SARS-CoV-2 between humans and mammals

  1. Takuma Hayashi
  2. Kaoru Aboko
  3. Masaki Mandan
  4. Nobuo Yaegashi
  5. Ikuo Konishi

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Abstract

In June 2020, a second wave of coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) infections raised concern in Beijing, where salmon sold a fresh fish wholesale market was suspected of being the source of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infections. It has raised questions in the press and elsewhere about the scientific basis of salmon as a source of infection. With the number of cases growing, the surface of a salmon chopping board in the market was examined for the presence of SARS-CoV-2 and a positive reaction was observed. Following these test results, there has been debate over whether salmon can be infected with SARS-CoV-2. To find assess this, we investigated the structural homology of angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), a host-side receptor for SARS-CoV-2, between humans and other species including salmon and mink. As a result, a high structural homology between ACE2 and mink, which has reportedly transmitted SARS-CoV-2 to humans, was confirmed. However, a non-high structural homology of ACE2 between salmon and humans was observed. Further experiments are needed to find the source of SARS-CoV-2 transmission to the salmon.

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    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.07.09.196378: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    NIH rigor criteria are not applicable to paper type.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    Amino acid homological analysis was performed using Align Sequences Protein BLAST (algorithm protein–protein BLAST) with the protein accession numbers of ACE2s listed in the NCBI Reference Sequence Database in order to determine the whole amino acid homology of ACE2 between humans and other animals.
    BLAST
    suggested: (BLASTX, RRID:SCR_001653)
    Phylogenetic analyses of the complete protein and major coding regions were performed with RAxML software (version 8.2.9) with 1000 bootstrap replicates using the general time-reversible nucleotide substitution model.
    RAxML
    suggested: (RAxML, RRID:SCR_006086)
    Amino Acid Homology Analysis of the Binding Region of ACE2 for Interaction with SARS-CoV-2 Spike Glycoprotein Between Humans and Other Animals: The binding region for interaction with the SARS-CoV-2 spike glycoprotein (82.aa-MYP-84.aa, 353.aa-KGDFR-357.aa) of the verified genome amino acid sequences of human ACE2 was predicted using the NCBI protein database and Geneious software (version 11.1.5; Auckland
    NCBI
    suggested: (NCBI, RRID:SCR_006472)
    Geneious
    suggested: (Geneious, RRID:SCR_010519)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

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  2. Version published to 10.1101/2020.07.09.196378v1 on bioRxiv