Saudi Press

Saudi Arabia and the world
Thursday, Oct 02, 2025

Cambodian scientists find close match for coronavirus in samples from 2010

Cambodian scientists find close match for coronavirus in samples from 2010

Viral sequences in samples taken from horseshoe bats have a 92 per cent similarity to pathogen that causes Covid-19, researchers say.

With a World Health Organization investigation into the origins of the coronavirus which causes the Covid-19 disease under way in China, a laboratory in Cambodia has discovered close relatives of the pathogen in samples that have been stored in a freezer for more than a decade.

Two viruses found in the samples, taken from horseshoe bats in northeastern Cambodia in 2010 and identified in research released on Tuesday, have a 92.6 per cent similarity to SARS-CoV-2 behind the Covid-19 pandemic. That makes them the closest relatives uncovered outside China and adds new information to the investigation into where the pathogen came from.

The closest known relative to the virus that causes Covid-19 is a bat virus found in southwest China’s Yunnan province, which has a 96.2 per cent similarity.


The latest discovery, by researchers at the Pasteur Institute in Cambodia in Phnom Penh, comes as the WHO-backed team is working to understand how the coronavirus began spreading in Wuhan, central China, where it was first identified in late 2019.

Little is known about how the outbreak started, but scientists suspect the virus may have originated in bats before passing to humans either directly or via an intermediary animal.

Chinese officials have suggested the virus may have come from overseas. The WHO has said it is too soon to jump to any conclusions.

The hunt for the origin has led a number of labs to back-test stored animal samples for traces of similar viruses in an effort to provide more clues.

The findings from Phnom Penh, which have not been peer reviewed, “suggest that Southeast Asia represents a key area to consider in the ongoing search for the origins of SARS-CoV-2, and in future surveillance for coronaviruses’’, said the researchers, who include scientists from Sorbonne University and Pasteur Institute in France and the University of California, Davis in the US.

They also add new data to a body of evidence showing Southeast Asia and southern China as hotspots for this larger group of coronaviruses.

The Cambodian viruses were picked up in swabs taken from Shamel’s horseshoe bats as part of a project backed by Unesco, in which researchers were comparing species diversity on two sides of the Mekong River in northern Cambodia.

The samples were transported back to the institute, where they were stored at minus 80 degrees Celsius (minus 112 degrees Fahrenheit), the paper said.

Following the outbreak of Covid-19, the scientists began running additional tests on stored samples in search of related coronaviruses. Of the 430 samples they looked at, 16 tested positive for coronaviruses, and among those were two nearly identical strains that turned out to be the close SARS-CoV-2 relatives.

In November, Veasna Duong, a virologist at the institute told the scientific publication Nature about early findings which indicated there could be a close relative. The team was still waiting for the genetic sequencing to understand exactly how close the virus might be to the one that caused Covid-19, the journal reported at the time.

Though the genetic results released on Tuesday did not reveal a closer match than the known relatives in China, the researchers said their analysis suggested SARS-CoV-2 related viruses had a much wider geographic distribution than previously understood. The Shamel’s horseshoe bat species carrying the Cambodian viruses is not known to live in China.

This “possibly reflects a lack of sampling in Southeast Asia”, they said, calling for more surveillance in the region, which is home to both a high diversity of bats and wildlife as well as wildlife trade and land-use change – known drivers of emerging infectious diseases.

Members of the WHO team in China have expressed similar opinions on the need for more regional data.

Virologist Marion Koopmans of the Erasmus University Medical Centre in the Netherlands said on Wednesday that the Cambodian findings were “adding to our knowledge on SARS-Cov (-2) like viruses in bats in the region”.

“Data from Laos, Vietnam, Myanmar would also be needed,” she said on Twitter, adding that the hunt for the closest relatives of the pandemic virus was like searching for a needle in a haystack.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Saudi Press
0:00
0:00
Close
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
Nvidia and Abu Dhabi’s TII Launch First AI-&-Robotics Lab in the Middle East
UK, Canada, and Australia Officially Recognise Palestine in Historic Shift
New Eye Drops Show Promise in Replacing Reading Glasses for Presbyopia
Dubai Property Boom Shows Strain as Flippers Get Buyer’s Remorse
Top AI Researchers Are Heading Back to China as U.S. Struggles to Keep Pace
JWST Data Brings TRAPPIST-1e Closer to Earth-Like Habitability
UAE-US Stargate Project Poised to Make Abu Dhabi a Global AI Powerhouse
Trump and Starmer Clash Over UK Recognition of Palestinian State Amid State Visit
Saudi Arabia cracks down on music ‘lounges’ after conservative backlash
Saudi Arabia Signs ‘Strategic Mutual Defence’ Pact with Pakistan, Marking First Arab State to Gain Indirect Access to Nuclear Strike Capabilities in the Region
Sam Altman sells the 'Wedding Estate' in Hawaii for 49 million dollars
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Kuwait opens bidding for construction of three cities to ease housing crunch.
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Indian Student Engineers Propose “Project REBIRTH” to Protect Aircraft from Crashes Using AI, Airbags and Smart Materials
Could AI Nursing Robots Help Healthcare Staffing Shortages?
Turkish authorities seize leading broadcaster amid fraud and tax investigation
Qatari prime minister says Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages
Apple Introduces Ultra-Thin iPhone Air, Enhanced 17 Series and New Health-Focused Wearables
Big Oil Slashes Jobs and Investments Amid Prolonged Low Crude Prices
Social Media Access Curtailed in Turkey After CHP Calls for Rallies Following Police Blockade of Istanbul Headquarters
Did the Houthis disrupt the internet in the Middle East? Submarine cables cut in the Red Sea
Gold Could Reach Nearly $5,000 if Fed Independence Is Undermined, Goldman Sachs Warns
Uruguay, Colombia and Paraguay Secure Places at 2026 World Cup
Trump Administration Advances Plans to Rebrand Pentagon as Department of War Instead of the Fake Term Department of Defense
Tether Expands into Gold Sector with Profit-Driven Diversification
Trump’s New War – and the ‘Drug Tyrant’ Fearing Invasion: ‘1,200 Missiles Aimed at Us’
At the Parade in China: Laser Weapons, 'Eagle Strike,' and a Missile Capable of 'Striking Anywhere in the World'
Information Warfare in the Age of AI: How Language Models Become Targets and Tools
Israeli Airstrike in Yemen Kills Houthi Prime Minister
After the Shock of Defeat, Iranians Yearn for Change
YouTube Altered Content by Artificial Intelligence – Without Permission
Iran Faces Escalating Water Crisis as Protests Spread
More Than Half a Million Evacuated as Typhoon Kajiki Heads for Vietnam
HSBC Switzerland Ends Relationships with Over 1,000 Clients from Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Qatar, and Egypt
Sharia Law Made Legally Binding in Austria Despite Warnings Over 'Incompatible' Values
Dogfights in the Skies: Airbus on Track to Overtake Boeing and Claim Aviation Supremacy
Tim Cook Promises an AI Revolution at Apple: "One of the Most Significant Technologies of Our Generation"
Are AI Data Centres the Infrastructure of the Future or the Next Crisis?
Miles Worth Billions: How Airlines Generate Huge Profits
Zelenskyy Returns to White House Flanked by European Allies as Trump Pressures Land-Swap Deal with Putin
Beijing is moving into gold and other assets, diversifying away from the dollar
Cristiano Ronaldo Makes Surprise Stop at New Hong Kong Museum
Zelenskyy to Visit Washington after Trump–Putin Summit Yields No Agreement
×