Bats Are Natural Reservoirs of SARS-Like Coronaviruses
Wendong Li(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Zhengli Shi(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Meng Yu(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Wuze Ren(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Craig Smith(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Jonathan H. Epstein(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Hanzhong Wang(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Gary Crameri(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Zhìhóng Hú(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Huajun Zhang(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Jianhong Zhang(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Jennifer A. McEachern(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Hume Field(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Peter Daszak(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Bryan T. Eaton(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Shuyi Zhang(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness), Lin‐Fa Wang(Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness)
Cited by 2,652Open Access
Abstract
Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) emerged in 2002 to 2003 in southern China. The origin of its etiological agent, the SARS coronavirus (SARS-CoV), remains elusive. Here we report that species of bats are a natural host of coronaviruses closely related to those responsible for the SARS outbreak. These viruses, termed SARS-like coronaviruses (SL-CoVs), display greater genetic variation than SARS-CoV isolated from humans or from civets. The human and civet isolates of SARS-CoV nestle phylogenetically within the spectrum of SL-CoVs, indicating that the virus responsible for the SARS outbreak was a member of this coronavirus group.
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