Figure 1.
A 12-bp deletion in the E gene found in SARS-CoV-2. Nucleotide (A) and amino acid (B) sequence alignments of the E genes of SARS-CoV Tor2, bat coronavirus RaTG13, and four SARS-CoV-2 strains (8#, F8, 8X, Wuhan-Hu-1). (C) Electrophoresis of the partial E gene PCR products from F8 and 8X. M: marker. (D) Detection of the E gene mutant in 14 clinical specimens, and in the original specimen and passages 1 and 2 (P0, P1 and P2) of viral culture before plaque purification. Viral loads of P1 and P2 were quantitated by Tagman RT-PCR based on the standard curves obtained from 10-fold serial dilutions of the F8 strain with 106.5 TCID50/ml.