Rhinolophus malayanus, photo by Pipat Soisook by: Alexis M. Brown SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, shares a high degree of nucleotide similarity with a coronavirus of unknown human spillover potential isolated from bats. But does “high nucleotide similarity” between two viral strains mean that they are functionally equivalent, or that a virus found in …
Why are so many viruses being discovered in bats? Contributed by: Melissa Ingala In the age of COVID-19, the news abounds with reports of “new” viruses discovered in bats across the globe. Given all this new information, it’s reasonable to wonder why so many novel viruses are being discovered in bats, and how we …
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How ‘special’ are bats as reservoirs of human disease? By Cara Brook and Sarah Guth We think that bats are pretty special. Bats are the only mammals capable of powered flight, and they make up over 1,400 species—accounting for some one-fifth of the planet’s mammalian diversity! Bats offer many important services to the ecosystems they …
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No, Aussie bats won’t give you COVID-19. We rely on them more than you think Justin Welbergen, CC BY-SA Pia Lentini, University of Melbourne; Alison Peel, Griffith University; Hume Field, The University of Queensland, and Justin Welbergen, Western Sydney University In this pandemic it’s tempting to look for someone, or something, to blame. Bats are …
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Human impacts and the spillover of zoonotic viruses Contributed by most infectious diseases of humans emerge from animals. Examples such as influenza A virus stand out owing to their pronounced and lasting epidemiological consequences. However, the study of zoonotic pathogens in their animal hosts has only recently reached a point where large-scale comparative studies can help …
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Killing Bats Won’t Help Prevent Disease, But Here’s What Will Contributed by: Melissa Ingala & Ariadna Morales Many people are under the impression that all bats carry diseases that could pose threats to humans. This concern has recently increased because a virus hosted by one bat species seems to be a distant relative of …
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Rhinolophus affinis from Thailand. Photo by Charles Francis. Based on virus genome sequencing, bats have been mentioned in connection to the origin of SARS-CoV2 from the very beginning. This early picture then became more complicated as in depth-analyses revealed a key part of the viral genome that enables entry into host cells —the receptor binding domain …
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