The micron variant of the new coronavirus is of concern to the global scientific community due to the large number of mutations. As they are very simple microorganisms, viruses tend to mutate as they are transmitted from one person to another. Some mutations do not represent any type of change in viral characteristics, others may confer advantages such as increased transmissibility.
Italian scientists released on Saturday (27), the first graphic image that represents the structure of this new lineage, classified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a variant of concern.
Published by the Bambino Gesù hospital in Rome, the image shows one of the structures of the Spike protein, used by the coronavirus to invade human cells, a fundamental part of the infection process. In the photo, the image of the Ômicron variant appears alongside the representation of the Delta variant, showing a higher number of mutations.
what the pictures say
The graphic-like image shows numerous points associated with mutations of the new coronavirus, with different colors related to the level of variability.
Red dots indicate areas with very high variability, orange markings indicate high variability, yellow dots indicate medium variability, green and blue dots suggest low variability. The area set to gray is one that does not vary.
“It is clearly seen that the Ômicron variant has many more mutations than the Delta variant (already very varied), concentrated mainly in an area of the protein that interacts with human cells,” the researchers said in a statement.
According to the authors of the study, the greater number of mutations in the Ômicron variant does not necessarily indicate that they are dangerous, but show that the virus has adapted even more to the human species when generating another variant.
Complementary studies are needed to answer whether the adaptation of the virus is neutral, more or less dangerous in terms of transmissibility, disease severity and escape from the effectiveness of vaccines.
The work was carried out by specialists in Multimodal Medicine at the Bambino Gesù hospital, coordinated by researcher Carlo Federico Perno, supervised by scientist Claudia Alteri (in collaboration with the University of Milan), with the participation of specialists Valentino Costabile, Rossana Scutari and Luna Colagrossi.
Reference: CNN Brasil
