Fig. 1.

SARS-CoV-2 and its engagement with host cell. SARS-CoV-2 is an enveloped beta coronavirus with positive sense single stranded RNA as its genome. (A) A schematic representation of the virion, that has four main structural proteins: Spike (S) protein, Membrane (M) protein, Envelope (E) protein and Nucleocapsid (N) protein. (B) It depicts the engagement of spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 to angiotensin converting enzyme -2 (ACE-2) of the host cell. S protein has two components: i) S1 that attaches to the ACE-2 of the host cell and ii) S2 that mediates the fusion of host cell membrane and viral membrane leading to the endocytosis of viral particle by host cell.