To efficiently infect human cells, SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is able to use a receptor called Neuropilin-1, which is very abundant in many human tissues including the respiratory tract, blood vessels and neurons. The breakthrough discovery was made by a German-Finnish team of researchers led by neuroscientists Mika Simons, Technical University of Munich, Germany and virologist Giuseppe Balistreri, Faculty of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Helsinki, Finland. Why is the new coronavirus so infectious? "That SARS-CoV-2 uses the receptor ACE2 to infect our cells was known, but viruses often use multiple factors to maximize their infectious potential"...