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The Long-Term Evolutionary History of Gradual Reduction of CpG Dinucleotides in the SARS-CoV-2 Lineage1.42 MB
Published VersionCC BY V4.0, Open Access
Journal article
The Long-Term Evolutionary History of Gradual Reduction of CpG Dinucleotides in the SARS-CoV-2 Lineage
Biology , Vol.10(1), pp.1-9
2021
PMID: 33445785
Appears in COVID-19 Research
Abstract
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) caused the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a pandemic that infected over 81 million people worldwide. This has led the scientific community to characterize the genome of this virus, including its nucleotide composition. Investigation of the dinucleotide frequency revealed that the proportion of CG dinucleotides (CpG) is highly reduced in the viral genomes. Since CpG dinucleotides is the target site for the host antiviral zinc finger protein, it has been suggested that the reduction in the proportion of CpG is the viral response to escape from the host defense machinery. In the present study, we investigated the time of origin of reduction in the CpG content. Whole genome analyses based on all representative viral genomes of the group Betacoronavirus revealed that the CpG content in the lineage of SARS-CoV-2 has been progressively declining over the past 1213 years. The depletion of CpG was found to occur at neutral—as well as selectively constrained—positions of the viral genomes.
Details
- Title
- The Long-Term Evolutionary History of Gradual Reduction of CpG Dinucleotides in the SARS-CoV-2 Lineage
- Authors
- Sankar Subramanian (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science and Engineering - Legacy
- Publication details
- Biology , Vol.10(1), pp.1-9
- Publisher
- MDPI AG
- Date published
- 2021
- DOI
- 10.3390/biology10010052
- ISSN
- 2079-7737
- PMID
- 33445785
- Copyright note
- © 2021 by the author. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
- Data Availability
- No new data were created in this study. Data sharing is not applicable to this article.
- Grant note
- This research was funded by the University of the Sunshine Coast (DVC-R&I grant).
- Organisation Unit
- School of Science and Engineering - Legacy; School of Science, Technology and Engineering; Centre for Bioinnovation
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99506306602621
- Output Type
- Journal article
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