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Novel Corona Virus has become the talk and thought of the year disturbing the entire world with its new disease COVID. Being totally new, it has become a challenge to diagnose and treat the victims. Thus, it is necessary to understand in detail the genomics of the virus, thereby predicting its evolutionary relation to the other known organisms. This can provide an insight for the development of diagnosis and treatment methodology. In view of the importance of understanding the genetic make of NCoV, the current work was undertaken. The chapter deals in detail with the genomic sequence, important regions, conservations and variations in the genetic make up of the Novel Corona virus.

The detailed structural analysis of the ORF1ab polyprotein was carried out to study its Physiochemical characterization as well as its domain annotations.

In order to develop any diagnostic or therapeutic protocol for COVID19 it is necessary to study the genome and proteome of the NCoV and annotate the proteins to identify its phylogeny and evolutionary relation with the other known organisms. The SARS NCoV and MERS Corona Virus belong to the Corona group of viruses and both are known to cause Respiratory illness. There is a very close similarity in the disease manifestation and mode of transmission in MERS and COVID forming basis for the comparison between the two organisms. Hence the proteins of novel Corona virus are compared with those of MERS Corona Virus (Fig. 3.1).

Apart from the treatment options, protocols and preventive measures against COVID, an essential step prior to the treatment is its quick and accurate diagnosis. There are several diagnostic protocols prevailing currently for the identification of COVID infection. The Gold standard available diagnosis is based on the identification of pathogen by RTPCR analysis [1]. This involves extraction of the genetic material of the virus followed by its amplification using specific primers and identification.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2)/Novel Corona Virus Disease-19 (nCOVID-19)/COVID-19 has only been discovered recently, and so our understanding of the disease epidemiology is continuously evolving. WHO has declared it a worldwide pandemic with high morbidity and significant mortality, hence it has been announced as the global health and wealth emergency. At present there is no any specific therapy available to fight against this virus, hence the drug repositioning is the most challenging to entire scientific community. The aim of this study is to determine the mutation(s) in the sequence of the spike protein, which plays a significant role in transmission from human to human. By using bioinformatics approach first we analyzed spike protein sequence of four nearest coronavirus family that include COVID-19, bat coronavirus RaTG13, pangolian coronavirus and SARS CoV, to determine phylogenetic distance between them. The homology modeling of COVID-19 spike protein has been done by iTASSER. and the protein-protein docking with human receptor ACE2 by Frodock web based docking tool showing the less binding energy of COVID-19 (−12.7 kcal/mol) in comparison with SARS CoV (10.3 kcal/mol). Further, the superimposed structure of COVID-19 and SARS CoV viruses has been performed to find the mutational site in association with human ACE2 protein. The extensive and detailed computational analyses approaches help to identify conserved region of COVID-19 and SARS CoV. Hence, our present data might help to identify potential target site and to develop antiviral drugs/vaccine to combat this pandemic.

It is an urgent requirement of 2020 to develop a drug which can successfully treat the patients of COVID19 and gift them a healthy life back.