Daily Current Affairs Article 28th December 2020: A new mutated form of the novel coronavirus that appears more transmissible than the original has raised alarm in the U.K. and around the world. It does not appear to cause more severe disease, and the newly available vaccines do seem to protect people against it.
In an RNA virus such as SARS-CoV-2, proteins are made of a sequence of amino acids. Such a virus contains some 30,000 ‘base pairs’, which are like bricks placed next to each other to form a structure. An alteration in this base can be a mutation, effectively changing the shape and behaviour of the virus.
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In the UK variant, one mutation has made the virus more likely to bind with human proteins called receptors. This is called N501Y.
In simple words, the amino acid represented by the letter N, and present at position 501 in the coronavirus genetic structure, has been replaced in that position with another amino acid, represented by Y.
The position where this alteration has taken place is in the spike protein’s receptor-binding domain. (It is the spike protein of the virus that binds with the human receptor.)
Therefore, the mutation has increased the binding affinity of the coronavirus. The mutated virus reportedly accounts for 60% of recent infections in London.
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