A Unique Protease Cleavage Site Predicted in the Spike Protein of the Novel Pneumonia Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Potentially Related to Viral Transmissibility

In summary, our sequence analysis on the S protein of 2019-nCoV has predicted a novel furin cleavage site at S1/S2 linkage. The ubiquitous expression of furin in different organs and tissues may be a reason for the high transmissibility and pathogenicity of 2019-nCoV observed in the current epidemic. However, since our findings were mainly based on bioinformatic analysis, more laboratory studies on 2019-nCoV in cell and animal models are required to verify our speculations and to avoid any bias.