Question

1. Describe the basic structure of the coronavirus, SARS-CoV2. What is the difference between SARS-CoV2 and COVID-19?
2. How does the virus infect our body cells? How does the structure of the viral coat interact with the structure of the plasma membrane of human cells to facilitate entry of the virus?
3. Once the virus has entered the cells, how does it "hijack"organelles in the human cell to do its own work of protein synthesis and replication?
4. Which organs does the virus infect? What type of epithelial cells does this virus infect in our bodies?

Answer 1

SARS - Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, SARS CoV2 has a crystal structure which has a receptor binding domain with a spike protein and also had two virus binding spots.This has four main components of protein that is Spike,Small envelope glycoprotein,Glycoprotein membrane,and a nucleocapsid protein.

SARS CoV2 : N Protein,Matrix,Spike,E Protein,ssRNA.

Difference between SARS CoV2 and Covid 19

Initially Covid 19 is Co means Corona and Vi means Virus and 19 is the year this out break was started.This is to adress the corona virus family that has been spreaded into humans.Later after some days this Corona virus was found to be creating acute respiratory syndrome which was previously occurred in 2002 and as this is the second one with the virus Corona and is considered as SARS-CoV2.

The virus actually entered the body cells through nose,eyes and mouth and then it attaches to the cells in the airway which produces a protein known as ACE2.Then the virus infects the cells by fusion to the oil membrane and then the corona virus releases a snippet of genetic material known as RNA.

Hijacking cells: The genome of the virus is less than 39,000 genetic length.Then the infected cell reads the RNA and helps to assemble new copies of the viruses.As the infection progresses the machinery of the cell begins to churn out new spikes and thus the other proteins also forms more copies of corona virus.

The immune system overreacts to the replication of new copies and thus attacks the lung cells initially.So the lungs become obstructed with fluid and finds a person difficult to breathe.This leads to acute respiratory syndrome and possible death.

The nasal epithelial cells , upper oesophagus and stratified epithelial cells gets infected with the virus.