The persistent prevalence and evolution of cross-family recombinant coronavirus GCCDC1 among a bat population: a two-year follow-up

Joseph O. Obameso
Hong Li
Hao Jia
Min Han
Shiyan Zhi
Canping Huang
Yuhui Zhao
Min Zhao
Yu Bai
Fei Yuan
Honglan Zhao
Xia Peng
Wen Xu
Wenjie Tan
Yingze Zhao
Kwok-Yung Yuen
William J. Liu
Lin Lu
George F. Gao

Abstract

Bats are connected with the increasing numbers of emerging and re-emerging viruses that may break the species barrier and spread into the human population. Coronaviruses are one of the most common viruses discovered in bats, which were considered as the natural source of recent human-susceptible coronaviruses, i.e. SARS-COV and MERS-CoV. Our previous study reported the discovery of a bat-derived putative cross-family recombinant coronavirus with a reovirus gene p10, named as Ro-BatCoV GCCDC1. In this report, through a two-year follow-up of a special bat population in one specific cave of south China, we illustrate that Ro-BatCoV GCCDC1 persistently circulates among bats. Notably, through the longitudinal observation, we identified the dynamic evolution of Ro-BatCoV GCCDC1 in bats represented by continuously recombination events. Our study provides the first glimpse of the virus evolution in one longitudinally observed bat population cohort and underlines the surveillance and pre-warning of potential interspecies transmittable viruses in bats.