Extended Data Figure 2. The competition of other SARS-CoV-2 mutants with wt in hamsters.

a-h, Eight SARS-CoV-2 spike mutants: Δ69–70 (a), Δ145 (b), A570D (c), P681H (d), T716I (e), S982A (f), D1118H (g) and UK-8x (h) were mixed with wt virus at a ratio of approximately 1:1. The mixture was then inoculated intranasally into donor hamsters and transmitted to the recipient hamsters following the scheme in Figure 1a. The total titer for infection was 10⁵ PFU per hamster. The ratios of the mutant:wt in the nasal washes of hamsters sampled 1–4 days after infection were estimated by Sanger sequencing. Red dots represent individual animals (n = 5), the horizontal lines in each catseye represent the mean, shaded regions represent standard error of the mean; y-axes use a log₁₀ scale. Black numbers above each set of values (catseye) indicate the relative fitness estimates. P values are calculated for the group (strain) coefficient for each linear regression model. *p<0.05; **p<0.01; ***p<0.001.