Introduction: Remarkably, B.1.351 contains additional two mutations,
K417N and
E484K, in receptor binding motif (RBM) of the
RBD region and those may potentially induce a conformational change of the
spike protein, and subsequently increase the infectivity of B.1.351 than other lineages.
Introduction: We show that SARS-CoV-2 B.1.351 variant harboring
K417N and
E484K mutations have naturally evolved to possess notable alterations in their infectivity and S1/S2 cleavage, leading to enhanced syncytium formation and antigenicity.