Diseases

Advances in Coronaviruses Research: Important Emerging Human Pathogens

Special Issue Editors
Special Issue Information
Keywords
Published Papers

A special issue of Diseases (ISSN 2079-9721). This special issue belongs to the section "Infectious Disease".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 June 2016) | Viewed by 50289

Share This Special Issue

Special Issue Editor

Assoc. Prof. Ding Xiang Liu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

School of Biological Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, 60 Nanyang Drive, Singapore 637551, Singapore
Interests: coronavirus; dengue virus; replication mechanisms; pathogenesis; virus-host interaction; anti-viral innate immunity

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Coronaviruses have been associated with human and animal diseases for many years. Human coronaviruses OC43 (HCoV-OC43) and 229E (HCoV-229E), the two community-acquired human coronaviruses, were recognized to cause a mild, self-limited respiratory infection (common cold) in human in the middle 1960s. This list of ‘low’ pathogenic coronaviruses was recently expanded by the addition of two human coronaviruses, human coronavirus NL63 (HCoV-NL63) in 2004 and HCoV-HKU1 in 2005. With the discovery of the two highly pathogenic, zoonotic coronaviruses, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) in 2003 and the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) in 2013, coronavirus infection is now emerging as a global public health concern.

The six human coronaviruses identified so far cause diseases with a range of clinical manifestations from mild respiratory infections to severe acute respiratory syndrome. This Special Issue provides an Open Access opportunity to publish research and review articles on human coronaviruses as emerging human pathogens. The focus will be put on a comprehensive review of current literature on viral pathogenesis, virus-host interaction and viral mechanisms to regulate host antiviral responses.

Assoc. Prof. Ding Xiang Liu
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Diseases is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

human coronaviruses
emerging pathogens
replication
pathogenesis
virus-host interactions
anti-viral immunity

Published Papers (3 papers)

Download All Papers

Review

Jump to: Other

3393 KiB

Open AccessReview

Distribution and Evolutionary History of the Mobile Genetic Element s2m in Coronaviruses

by Torstein Tengs and Christine M. Jonassen

Diseases 2016, 4(3), 27; https://doi.org/10.3390/diseases4030027 - 28 Jul 2016

Cited by 25 | Viewed by 6454

Abstract

The mobile genetic element s2m has been described in several families of single-stranded RNA viruses. The function remains elusive, but an increasing number of s2m-containing sequences are being deposited in publicly available databases. Currently, more than 700 coronavirus sequences containing s2m can be found in GenBank, including the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) coronavirus genome. This is an updated review of the pattern of s2m in coronaviruses, the possible functional implications and the evolutionary history. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Coronaviruses Research: Important Emerging Human Pathogens)

► Show Figures

Figure 1

3516 KiB

Open AccessFeature PaperReview

Human Coronaviruses: A Review of Virus–Host Interactions

by Yvonne Xinyi Lim, Yan Ling Ng, James P. Tam and Ding Xiang Liu

Diseases 2016, 4(3), 26; https://doi.org/10.3390/diseases4030026 - 25 Jul 2016

Cited by 351 | Viewed by 36438

Abstract

Human coronaviruses (HCoVs) are known respiratory pathogens associated with a range of respiratory outcomes. In the past 14 years, the onset of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) have thrust HCoVs into spotlight of the research community due to their high pathogenicity in humans. The study of HCoV-host interactions has contributed extensively to our understanding of HCoV pathogenesis. In this review, we discuss some of the recent findings of host cell factors that might be exploited by HCoVs to facilitate their own replication cycle. We also discuss various cellular processes, such as apoptosis, innate immunity, ER stress response, mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway and nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) pathway that may be modulated by HCoVs. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Coronaviruses Research: Important Emerging Human Pathogens)

► Show Figures

Figure 1

Other

Jump to: Review

1464 KiB

Open AccessBrief Report

Detection of Alphacoronavirus vRNA in the Feces of Brazilian Free-Tailed Bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) from a Colony in Florida, USA

by Tania S. Bonny, John P. Driver, Taylor Paisie, Marco Salemi, John Glenn Morris, Lisa A. Shender, Lisa Smith, Carolyn Enloe, Kevin Oxenrider, Jeffery A. Gore, Julia C. Loeb, Chang-Yu Wu and John A. Lednicky

Diseases 2017, 5(1), 7; https://doi.org/10.3390/diseases5010007 - 27 Feb 2017

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 6683

Abstract

Bats are natural reservoirs of coronaviruses and other viruses with zoonotic potential. Florida has indigenous non-migratory populations of Brazilian free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) that mostly roost in colonies in artificial structures. Unlike their counterparts in Brazil and Mexico, the viruses harbored by the Florida bats have been underexplored. We report the detection of an alphacoronavirus RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) gene sequence in the feces of two of 19 different T. brasiliensis that were capture/release bats that had been evaluated for overall health. The RdRp sequence is similar but not identical to previously detected sequences in the feces of two different species of bats (T. brasiliensis and Molossus molossus) in Brazil. In common with the experience of others doing similar work, attempts to isolate the virus in cell cultures were unsuccessful. We surmise that this and highly related alphacoronavirus are carried by Brazilian free-tailed bats living in a wide eco-spatial region. As various coronaviruses (CoVs) that affect humans emerged from bats, our study raises the question whether CoVs such as the one detected in our work are yet-to-be-detected pathogens of humans and animals other than bats. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Coronaviruses Research: Important Emerging Human Pathogens)

► Show Figures