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The history of coronaviruses is an account of the discovery of the diseases caused by coronaviruses and the diseases they cause. It starts with the first report of a new type of upper-respiratory tract disease among chickens in the U.S. state of North Dakota, in 1931. The causative agent was identified as a virus in 1933.
Spike (S) glycoprotein (sometimes also called spike protein, [2] formerly known as E2 [3]) is the largest of the four major structural proteins found in coronaviruses. [4] The spike protein assembles into trimers that form large structures, called spikes or peplomers, [3] that project from the surface of the virion.
The first demonstration of phagocytosis as a property of leukocytes, the immune cells, was from the German zoologist Ernst Haeckel. [14] [15] In 1846, English physician Thomas Wharton Jones had discovered that a group of leucocytes, which he called "granule-cell" (later renamed and identified as eosinophil [16]), could change shape, the phenomenon later called amoeboid movement.
For this reason the spike protein has been the focus of development for COVID-19 vaccines in response to the COVID-19 pandemic caused by the virus SARS-CoV-2. [11] [12] A subgenus of the betacoronaviruses, known as embecoviruses (not including SARS-like coronaviruses), have an additional shorter surface protein known as hemagglutinin esterase. [13]
Engulfment of material is facilitated by the actin-myosin contractile system. The phagosome is the organelle formed by phagocytosis of material. It then moves toward the centrosome of the phagocyte and is fused with lysosomes, forming a phagolysosome and leading to degradation. Progressively, the phagolysosome is acidified, activating ...
Interferon-alpha, an interferon type I, was identified in 1957 as a protein that interfered with viral replication. [5] The activity of interferon-gamma (the sole member of the interferon type II class) was described in 1965; this was the first identified lymphocyte-derived mediator. [6]
As health officials report a surge of winter viruses, health experts are warning that heart disease symptoms can sometimes mimic respiratory illnesses. Four viruses are circulating in the U.S ...
After tobacco mosaic was recognized as a virus disease, virus infections of many other plants were discovered. [34] The importance of tobacco mosaic virus in the history of viruses cannot be overstated. It was the first virus to be discovered, and the first to be crystallised and its structure shown in detail.