DOI: 10.1126/science.1118391 ISSN:
Bats Are Natural Reservoirs of SARS-Like Coronaviruses
Wendong Li, Zhengli Shi, Meng Yu, Wuze Ren, Craig Smith, Jonathan H. Epstein, Hanzhong Wang, Gary Crameri, Zhihong Hu, Huajun Zhang, Jianhong Zhang, Jennifer McEachern, Hume Field, Peter Daszak, Bryan T. Eaton, Shuyi Zhang, Lin-Fa Wang- Multidisciplinary
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.