RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Comparative pathogenicity of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron subvariants including BA.1, BA.2, and BA.5
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2022.08.05.502758
DO 10.1101/2022.08.05.502758
A1 Tomokazu Tamura
A1 Daichi Yamasoba
A1 Yoshitaka Oda
A1 Jumpei Ito
A1 Tomoko Kamasaki
A1 Naganori Nao
A1 Rina Hashimoto
A1 Yoichiro Fujioka
A1 Rigel Suzuki
A1 Lei Wang
A1 Hayato Ito
A1 Izumi Kimura
A1 Isao Yokota
A1 Mai Kishimoto
A1 Masumi Tsuda
A1 Hirofumi Sawa
A1 Kumiko Yoshimatsu
A1 Yusuke Ohba
A1 Yuki Yamamoto
A1 Tetsuharu Nagamoto
A1 Jun Kanamune
A1 The Genotype to Phenotype Japan (G2P-Japan) Consortium
A1 Keita Matsuno
A1 Kazuo Takayama
A1 Shinya Tanaka
A1 Kei Sato
A1 Takasuke Fukuhara
YR 2022
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2022/08/05/2022.08.05.502758.abstract
AB Unremitting emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants imposes us to continuous control measurement. Given the rapid spread, new Omicron subvariant named BA.5 is urgently required for characterization. Here we analyzed BA.5 with the other Omicron variants BA.1, BA.2, and ancestral B.1.1 comprehensively. Although in vitro growth kinetics of BA.5 is comparable among the Omicron subvariants, BA.5 become much more fusogenic than BA.1 and BA.2. The airway-on-a-chip analysis showed that the ability of BA.5 to disrupt the respiratory epithelial and endothelial barriers is enhanced among Omicron subvariants. Furthermore, in our hamster model, in vivo replication of BA.5 is comparable with that of the other Omicrons and less than that of the ancestral B.1.1. Importantly, inflammatory response against BA.5 is strong compared with BA.1 and BA.2. Our data suggest that BA.5 is still low pathogenic compared to ancestral strain but evolved to induce enhanced inflammation when compared to prior Omicron subvariants.Competing Interest StatementYuki Yamamoto and Tetsuharu Nagamoto are founders and shareholders of HiLung, Inc. Jun Kanamune is an employee of HiLung, Inc. Yuki Yamamoto is a co-inventor of patents (PCT/JP2016/057254; "Method for inducing differentiation of alveolar epithelial cells", PCT/JP2016/059786, "Method of producing airway epithelial cells"). The other authors declare that no competing interests exist.