Abstract: Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) is a zoonotic infection that emerged in the Middle East in 2012. Symptoms range from mild to severe and include both respiratory and gastrointestinal illnesses. The virus is mainly present in camel populations with occasional zoonotic spill over into humans. The severity of infection in humans is influenced by numerous factors, and similar to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), underlying health complications can play a major role. Currently, MERS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 are coincident in the Middle East and thus a rapid way of sequencing MERS-CoV to derive genotype information for molecular epidemiology is needed. Additionally, complicating factors in MERS-CoV infections are coinfections that require clinical management. The ability to rapidly characterize these infections would be advantageous. To rapidly sequence MERS-CoV, an amplicon-based approach was developed and coupled to Oxford Nanopore long read length sequencing. This and a metagenomic approach were evaluated with clinical samples from patients with MERS. The data illustrated that whole-genome or near-whole-genome information on MERS-CoV could be rapidly obtained. This approach provided data on both consensus genomes and the presence of minor variants, including deletion mutants. The metagenomic analysis provided information of the background microbiome. The advantage of this approach is that insertions and deletions can be identified, which are the major drivers of genotype change in coronaviruses.

Bio: Dr. Al-Jabr is a Consultant Clinical Research-Molecular Medical Virologist and the Chairperson of the Biorepository Department at the Research Center- King Fahad Medical City, Riyadh. He has an Honorary Research Fellow with the Institute of Infection & Global Health, University of Liverpool, UK. He earned his BSc from the College of Applied Medical Sciences, King Saud University in 2002. In 2009 he went to complete his Master’s degree in Medical Microbiology, Biomedical Sciences from the University of Ulster, UK. In 2016 he was awarded his PhD in Virology from the University of Liverpool, UK. His work focuses on respiratory and emerging viruses; SARS-CoV-2, MERS-CoV, HRSV, using OMICS approaches; metagenomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, and Oxford Nanopore sequence. He runs a research group composed of 1 PDRA, 2 Master students, co-supervised 4 PhD students. Dr. Al-Jabr has good experience in Clinical Virology since he served as Lab Specialist at King Khalid University Hospital, Riyadh for over 9 years, and for one year as a Consultant Clinical Lab Scientist at KFMC. Dr. Al-Jabr is working at the cutting edge of scientific and clinical research. And he has established beneficial research network relationships with many research groups at the national and international levels. He has research funding from the US-FDA to work on SARS-CoV-2 and MERS-CoV in human and animal models and medical countermeasures.