Coronavirus-2019: Origin and evolution

Coronavirus-2019, also called Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2019 or SARS-CoV-2 was first reported from China at the end of December 2019 through transmission into man from bat and it produced severe type of pneumonia in the infected people. Within the next month (January 2020), the virus started its world-wide journey after it successfully established the transmission path from man to man and thus created pandemic and caused epidemic. Facing a deadly challenge of the virus, the scientists all over the world, starting from almost zero-level knowledge about the virus, worked hard to know most of characters related to its biology and pathology at molecular level thereby enriching knowledge which helped in development of various tools and technologies to control the virus and develop protection and prevention methods including production of vaccine against the virus. Nevertheless, to exert a better control over the virus, it is necessary to have knowledge of various details about how the virus has been evolved. During the last one year, research work done by the scientists all over the world have produced voluminous data in this area, though in a scattered way. That information indicates that the virus is actively evolving continuously to generate new strains through gain of function mutations for its survival. In this short review, I have made an attempt to put together that information to highlight the present status of our knowledge about the mechanisms of evolution of SARS-CoV-2 at molecular level.