Two Asian laboratory freezers have yielded astonishing discoveries. Scientists recently said that they discovered a type of coronavirus almost related to SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for the pandemic, in "horseshoe bats stored in a freezer in Cambodia."
Another discovery is the one that a research team from Japan has reported. Specifically, they found another closely-related coronavirus, also in frozen bat droppings.
The newly-discovered viruses are the initially-identified relatives of SARS-CoV-2 to be discovered outside China, which supports the search of the World Health Organization across Asia for the animal origin of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Strong evidence proposed that SARS-CoV-2 originally came from horseshoe bats, although whether it passed directly from bats to people or via an intermediate host remains unknown.
Virus in Cambodia
The virus in Cambodia was discovered two Shamel's horseshoe bats or Rhinolophus shameli captured in the north part of the country in 2010.
Reports on the new discoveries said the genome of the virus has not yet been completely sequenced, neither its discovery publicized, making its entire essentiality to the pandemic difficult to determine.
According to Phnom Penh-based Institute Pasteur virologist Veasna Duong, the virus is quite closely related to, or even a predecessor of this pandemic virus; it could offer crucial information on the manner of passing of SARS-CoV-2 from bats to humans and inform the search for the origin of the pandemic.
Duong led the quest for old samples in Cambodia and informed Nature about their discovery early this month. To provide such understandings, researchers said, the virus would need to share over 97 percent of its genome with SARS-CoV-2, which they added, "is more than its closest known relative."
However, Paris-based Pasteur Institute's virologist, Etienne Simon-Loriere said, the new virus might be more distantly associated, in which case, examining it will help researchers to learn more about diversity in this particular virus family. Simon-Loriere is planning to sequence the virus, after which it will be publicly shared.
Discovery in Japan
That is the case with the other virus discovered, called Rc-o319, detected in a small Japanese horseshoe bat or Rhinolophus cornutus, which was captured in 2013.
The said virus, according to University of Sydney virologist Edward Holmes, is sharing about 81 percent of its genome with SARS-CoV, as indicated in a paper published early this month, making it too distant to offer understandings into the origin of the pandemic.
Meanwhile, evolutionary biologist Alice Latinne, from the Wildlife Conservation Society Vietnam in Hanoi said, no matter what the team from Cambodia found, both discoveries are "exciting as they validate that viruses closely associated with SARS-CoV-2 are comparatively common in Rhinolophus bats, and even in those found outside of China. Latinne has seen some of the analysis of the Cambodian team, although she was not part of the said research.
Origins of the Pandemic
According to infectious-diseases researcher Aaron Irving from Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China, research findings also proposed that other as yet to be discovered SARS-CoV-2 relatives could be stored in laboratory freezers. Irving is also planning to test stored samples of bats, as well as other mammals, for antibodies against COVID-19.
According to reports, just a handful of identified coronaviruses are closely linked to SARS-CoV-2, which includes its closest identified relative, the RaTG13, which was discovered in intermediate horseshoe bats or Rhinolophus affinis in China's Yunnan province in 2013, and was published just in early 2020.
Several other coronaviruses were also found in other "Rhinolophus bats and pangolins" caught from 2015 to 2019, which researchers now know to be linked to SARS-CoV-2.
Associate Director of the One Health Institute at the University of California, Davis, Tracey Goldstein said, probably, "SARS-CoV-2 was not a brand new virus that popped up all of a sudden."
Viruses in this group, Goldstein, who was involved in the Cambodian team continued, existed before the entire world became aware of them last year.
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