Phase transitions may explain why SARS-CoV-2 spreads so fast and why new variants are spreading faster

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外文摘要：© 2022The novel coronavirus SARS CoV-2 responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic and SARS CoV-1 responsible for the SARS epidemic of 2002-2003 share an ancestor yet evolved to have much different transmissibility and global impact 1. A previously developed thermodynamic model of protein conformations hypothesized that SARS CoV-2 is very close to a new thermodynamic critical point, which makes it highly infectious but also easily displaced by a spike-based vaccine because there is a tradeoff between transmissibility and robustness 2. The model identified a small cluster of four key mutations of SARS CoV-2 that predicts much stronger viral attachment and viral spreading compared to SARS CoV-1. Here we apply the model to the SARS-CoV-2 variants Alpha (B.1.1.7), Beta (B.1.351), Gamma (P.1) and Delta (B.1.617.2)3 and predict, using no free parameters, how the new mutations will not diminish the effectiveness of current spike based vaccines and may even further enhance infectiousness by augmenting the binding ability of the virus.

外文关键词：

EvolutionProteinsSpikeVaccinesVirus

作者：

Phillips J.C.、Moret M.A.、Zebende G.F.、Chow C.C.

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作者单位：

Department of Physics and Astronomy Rutgers University

SENAI CIMATEC Salvador

Department of Physics State University of Feira de Santana

Mathematical Biology Section NIDDK NIH

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出版年：

2022

DOI：

10.1016/j.physa.2022.127318

Physica

ISSN：0378-4371

年,卷(期)：2022.598

参考文献量34