Figure 3.
New deletion mutations present in the Spike proteins sequences derived from COVID-19 patients including vaccinated patients. (a) Whole genome sequencing of SARS-CoV-2 isolated from hospitalized COVID-19 patients or vaccination breakthroughs/reinfections from Mayo Clinic. (b) Barplot showing comparison of frequencies of deletions in patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 Alpha variant. New group of emerging deletions in the 85–90 region that is highly enriched compared to the background population is highlighted. The deletions in the other rarer lineages (e.g. Gamma variant) are not shown for clarity. The site of the emerging deletion mutations in patients is shown as spheres on the 3D structure of the Spike protein complexed with neutralizing antibody 4A8 (PDB identifier: 7C2L described by Chi et al.18, retrieved from the PDB). (c) Heatmap displaying temporal trend of increasing frequency of deletions corresponding to 85–90 region based on global SARS-CoV-2 genomic data from the GISAID database. The columns correspond to months and rows correspond to positions with deletions in the 85–90 region. The frequency of the mutations is mapped to a color scale of white to black.