Molecular Medicine Israel

Coronavirus’s Genetics Reveal Its Global Travels

Random mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 pathogen’s genome help researchers track the spread and transmission of COVID-19, the disease it causes.

Several years ago, Richard Neher, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Basel in Switzerland, and his colleagues wanted to monitor changes to the flu’s genetic makeup to see if the data would help scientists build more-effective flu vaccines. They developed an online interface that integrated the latest viral sequencing data, analyzed it, and published the results in a publicly available interactive web browser.
“Then we thought, why just flu, why not other viruses?”…

Sign up for our Newsletter