Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2023 Feb 20;15(2):578.
doi: 10.3390/v15020578.

Human Coronavirus OC43 as a Low-Risk Model to Study COVID-19

Mi Il Kim  1 , Choongho Lee  1
Affiliations
Review

Human Coronavirus OC43 as a Low-Risk Model to Study COVID-19

Mi Il Kim et al. Viruses. .

Abstract

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had irreversible and devastating impacts on every aspect of human life. To better prepare for the next similar pandemic, a clear understanding of coronavirus biology is a prerequisite. Nevertheless, the high-risk nature of the causative agent of COVID-19, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), requires the use of a cumbersome biosafety level-3 (BSL-3) confinement facility. To facilitate the development of preventive and therapeutic measures against SARS-CoV-2, one of the endemic strains of low-risk coronaviruses has gained attention as a useful research alternative: human coronavirus OC43 (HCoV-OC43). In this review, its history, classification, and clinical manifestations are first summarized. The characteristics of its viral genomes, genes, and evolution process are then further explained. In addition, the host factors necessary to support the life cycle of HCoV-OC43 and the innate, as well as adaptive, immunological responses to HCoV-OC43 infection are discussed. Finally, the development of in vitro and in vivo systems to study HCoV-OC43 and its application to the discovery of potential antivirals for COVID-19 by using HCoV-OC43 models are also presented. This review should serve as a concise guide for those who wish to use HCoV-OC43 to study coronaviruses in a low-risk research setting.

Keywords: COVID-19; OC43; biosafety level; human coronavirus; low-risk model.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Comparison of major characteristics of SARS-CoV-2 and HCoV-OC43. Despite belonging to the same beta coronavirus, HCoV-OC43 is classified as an endemic coronavirus. In addition, due to its mild clinical symptoms, its biology can be studied under the BSL-2 research setting. Therefore, HCoV-OC43 can serve as a good research alternative to SARS-CoV-2. This illustration was created with BioRender.com.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Comparison of abbreviated genomic maps of HCoV-OC43 with other coronaviruses including HCoV-229E, HCoV-NL63, HCoV-HKU, MERS-CoV, and SARS-CoV-2 (not to the scale). Used acronyms are as follows. ORF; open reading frame, HE; hemagglutinin-esterase, S; spike, E; envelope, M; membrane, N; nucleocapsid. Number-only genes (2a, 5a, 3a, 3b, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10) indicate nonstructural genes. Some in-between nonstructural genes from SARS-CoV-2 were not shown for purposes of better comparison.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Masters P.S. The molecular biology of coronaviruses. Adv. Virus Res. 2006;66:193–292. doi: 10.1016/S0065-3527(06)66005-3. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Cimolai N. Complicating Infections Associated with Common Endemic Human Respiratory Coronaviruses. Health Secur. 2020;19:195–208. doi: 10.1089/hs.2020.0067. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Gaunt E.R., Hardie A., Claas E.C., Simmonds P., Templeton K.E. Epidemiology and clinical presentations of the four human coronaviruses 229E, HKU1, NL63, and OC43 detected over 3 years using a novel multiplex real-time PCR method. J. Clin. Microbiol. 2010;48:2940–2947. doi: 10.1128/JCM.00636-10. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Coronaviridae Study Group of the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses The species Severe acute respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus: Classifying 2019-nCoV and naming it SARS-CoV-2. Nat. Microbiol. 2020;5:536–544. doi: 10.1038/s41564-020-0695-z. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Graham N.M. The epidemiology of acute respiratory infections in children and adults: A global perspective. Epidemiol. Rev. 1990;12:149–178. doi: 10.1093/oxfordjournals.epirev.a036050. - DOI - PubMed

Publication types

Substances

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korean government (MEST) (NRF-2022R1A2C1011629). This work was also supported by the Dongguk University Research Fund of 2021.